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9th & Hennepin Lyrics

Artist: Tom Waits

Well it's Ninth and Hennepin
All the doughnuts have names that sound like prostitutes
And the moon's teeth marks are on the sky
Like a tarp thrown all over this
And the broken umbrellas like dead birds
And the steam comes out of the grill
Like the whole goddamn town's ready to blow...
And the bricks are all scarred with jailhouse tattoos
And everyone is behaving like dogs
And the horses are coming down Violin Road
And Dutch is dead on his feet
And all the rooms they smell like diesel
And you take on the dreams of the ones who have slept here
And I'm lost in the window, and I hide in the stairway
And I hang in the curtain, and I sleep in your hat...
And no one brings anything small into a bar around here
They all started out with bad directions
And the girl behind the counter has a tattooed tear
One for every year he's away, she said
Such a crumbling beauty, ah
There's nothing wrong with her that a hundred dollars won't fix
She has that razor sadness that only gets worse
With the clang and the thunder of the Southern Pacific going by
And the clock ticks out like a dripping faucet
til you're full of rag water and bitters and blue ruin
And you spill out over the side to anyone who will listen...
And I've seen it all, I've seen it all
Through the yellow windows of the evening train...

Comments/Interpretations

by FantasmaBAnco on 8/27/2008 6:06pm
I'm pretty sure it goes

"And I'm lost in the window, and I hide in the stairway and I hang in the curtain and I sleep in your EYE"

by wdytia on 9/5/2008 6:13pm
i think you're quite wrong there.

by moi on 9/14/2008 5:30pm
And you take on the dreams of the ones who have slept here* there

by Orgazmatronic on 11/23/2008 4:49pm
No, it is "sleep in your hat"

by Matt on 3/28/2009 8:52pm
Definitly "sleep in your hat" and "...who have slept there" here doesn't make sense using the tense that hes speaking in

by Pillai on 8/17/2009 11:03am
Anyone got reminded of Poe's 'The Raven'?

by Phil on 12/29/2009 7:57pm
Dont see the Raven comparison really. I can see slight comparisons to Bukowski and Selby Jr in this though.

by FantasmaBAnco on 4/7/2010 5:50pm
OK... just listened to it for the first time through headphones. You're right, it is "hat".

Matt, the line goes "And you take on the dreams of the ones who have slept there" which is a fine fit with "the tense hes [sic] speaking in".

by chocolate_jesus on 10/29/2010 3:27am
anyone feel like sin city stole the feeling here to almost a T?

by Tankle on 2/1/2013 6:49am
NO... It's "and I sleep in your ass"

by Fatlover Horse on 5/1/2014 2:00pm
"and I sleep in your ass" talk about Mule Variations. And, "I Thought They Smell Bad On The Outside."

Jesus isn't the only one to make the Sin City connection: Check out Marv Goes Out West.

by bdubya on 5/13/2014 3:16pm
^ "Jesus isn't the only one to make the Sin City connection"

not a line from a Waits tune, but it really oughta be.