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Macarthur Park Lyrics

Artist: Donna Summer
Album: Macarthur Park

Spring was never waiting for us, girl
It ran one step ahead
As we followed in the dance
Between the parted pages and were pressed,
In love's hot, fevered iron
Like a striped pair of pants

CHORUS
MacArthur's Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet, green icing flowing down...
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don't think that I can take it
'cause it took so long to bake it
And I'll never have that recipe again
Oh, no!

I recall the yellow cotton dress
Foaming like a wave
On the ground around your knees
The birds, like tender babies in your hands
And the old men playing checkers by the trees

CHORUS



There will be another song for me
For I will sing it
There will be another dream for me
Someone will bring it
I will drink the wine while it is warm
And never let you catch me looking at the sun
And after all the loves of my life
After all the loves of my life
You'll still be the one.

I will take my life into my hands and I will use it
I will win the worship in their eyes and I will lose it
I will have the things that I desire
And my passion flow like rivers through the sky.
And after all the loves of my life
After all the loves of my life
I'll be thinking of you
And wondering why.

Chicago or even "Classical Gas" by Mason Williams>

MacArthur's Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet, green icing flowing down...
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don't think that I can take it
'cause it took so long to bake it
And I'll never have that recipe again
Oh, no!
Oh, no
No, no
Oh NO!! (upon which Harris suffers an irreversible gender change)

Comments/Interpretations

by on 5/22/2008 10:37pm
by passerby on 6/3/2008 12:00am
Um...the last bit after the final lyric is unnecessary. Especially since this is the lyric page for Donna Summer's cover of the song.
by denverbry on 6/17/2008 5:29pm
Donna was awesome on this song!!! What a great recording!
by qpwo5 on 6/21/2008 1:54am
it should say dear at the beginning not girl
by dywan89 on 7/1/2008 2:00am
yeah there are some lyrics that arent right,im listenin to the donna summers version now
by tom hardegree on 8/13/2009 2:04pm
there was a duet with a male artist on the track my son had
by Sandra Medina on 11/12/2009 6:09pm
they are playing Chinese checkers by the tree ....I am listening to the Donna Summer original version at this time...we were pressed...beneath your knees...several different words different from the song I am listening to...
by Sergio R Arbol on 12/22/2009 11:56am
This is/was one of the true gems of the disco era. Donna delivers a very powerful version, regardless more/less/changed words, whom producer (G. Moroder) must be very proud of....Great Job!
by android NFCT on 11/5/2011 7:16pm
Can you just imagine a powerful marching band halftime show playing this song? The trumpets, about 6 tubas pounding out the basic beat, nowadays they allow big percussion pit groups (in competitions); and a base guitar turned UP LOUD? Would be a blast with proper choreography shifting between the slow and fast parts.
by Caroline on 5/17/2012 2:59pm
No one mentioned anything about interpretation. She makes it clear in the beginning this song is for another female, by saying "girl". Baking brownies is just a slip in for something else, which even in the 70s, could not be sung about and recorded...not on a HIT album. It's clearly a love song involving a lesbian fling.
by brenda on 5/21/2012 12:15pm
I DISAGERE WITH CAROLINE!! THIS SONG WAS WRITTEN BY A MAN ABOUT HIS EX-GIRLFRIEND--DONNA PROBABLY KEPT THE LYRICS AS WRITTEN 'GIRL'! THAT'S CALLED KEEPING THE INTEGRITY OF THE SONG AND NOT COMPRIMISING THE WRITERS WORDS.
THE MAN THAT WROTE THIS SONG CLEARLY DID NOT WRITE OF A LESBIAN FLING!!! R.I.P. DONNA!!
by Carrie Hinkel-Gill (from Wisconsin) on 9/4/2012 4:13am
Caroline and Brenda - Um no.... The lyrics were changed and when Donna originally recorded it, she actually sang "dear" not "girl" (probably to blur the lines and make the song widely accepted) and nowhere is there mentioning of brownies, it was a cake and was a metaphor for time spent in MacArthur Park (an actual place). The entire song is a metaphor for the destruction of a love affair and the "singer's" reluctance to put so much effort into another relationship just to see it fall apart the same way this one did. It's also stressing that each relationship is unique.
by sarah on 9/9/2012 10:34am
What is this song about?
by Medley708 on 11/25/2012 5:32am
The most perfect song of all time. This put Donna Summer over the top as a challenger to Barbra Streisand. Rolling Stone considers this version to be one of the classics and compared the arrangement to be as good as Highway To Heaven and Freebird. Yes, it is that good.
by Sheila on 1/9/2013 5:54pm
While I like this version of the song I do think that Levi Stubbs of the Four Tops (Motown) did a much better rendition of this song. This is the same man who sang Bernadette and absolutely nailed this song each and every time he sang it. It really became his signature song.
by Gila on 3/2/2013 1:21pm
Hello, I ahd not ehrad this song in years. Until I got a Donna Summers Live VH1 cd the other day. I never knew what the lyrics really meant. I thought it was a real receipe or something like that. However, it is about a love affair gone bad and it was written by Jimmy Webb and sung first by Richard Harris in a dramatic type of reading way. Even his version was highly popular in the late 60's. But I love Donna's version. RIP.
by Miscellaneous on 3/6/2013 11:12pm
In the second verse it's "And the old man playing CHINESE checkers by the trees." It's chinese checkers, instead of just checkers.
by Elaine Wallace on 4/12/2013 11:54am
This song "was" my song in the 1970's I really related to it especially the part that says " I will have the things that I desire and my let my passions flow like rivers through the sky"
I did that lifestyle for five sad years....then a relationship with Jesus the Christ became more important ...no more sad life!
by juan molleja on 8/14/2013 3:55pm
there are several mistakes in the transcription revisión is necessary
by Mark Anthony on 12/20/2013 12:10am
The words are a reflection of her Life and Love, both of which we all should be put in retrospect. She sang from her heart and soul,she very clear that one must go on and not let life or love get them down Just have hope and persevere and with an end come a beginning. That's the message
by David on 5/4/2014 11:49pm
Caroline, don't quit your day job!
by Robb on 5/25/2017 12:08pm
It is just a GREAT LOVE SONG about a beautiful love affair that somehow went bad. And the one thing that seems to be definite in Donna Summer's version is love like this will never, ever happen again in this lifetime. Been there, done that, and got the T-shirt!
by Bob on 6/10/2017 2:23pm
The very best of the best times. Only those who experienced the 80's can appreciate this artist, this song, fully.








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