Ideal Home

He come looking for a promise
Chileno huyendo
From a narrow land to a wide one
In search of an ideal home
New York was a wedding table
Baby's cradle, bedtime song
But the snow came deep and the sun did sleep
For a night and a day too long
They bought the ring at Tiffany's
But they left their breakfast cold
Rowed to sea on the Queen Mary
Left the new world for the old

And it was there at the exhibition
Beneath the weight of Kensington
He strayed in the gaze of Olympia
And he answered Olympia's drum
Orphic he left them
Every vow undone
And he never chanced a backward glance
At an absent father's son
At his namesake, nature's saint
he never did dare to know
He never chanced a backward glance
At the ghost of an ideal home

But my dad grew tall too
Came the day when he heard the call
Of Brooklyn beach and the city streets
Where his long long legs did crawl
Joy Division, New Order
Some are born for the other side
My daddy ran from the dark of addiction
Crossed the pond for the second time
New York was a Warhol silkscreen
With a Haring redesign
My daddy script methadone for Joe Ramone
On the streets of the Lower East Side
And just like his father before him
A husband kissed a bride
And her vows were wreathed in legalese
His were poetry just like mine
Just like mine
Poetry just like mine

Now he's down at the feet of the Queen Mary
With the wife and the twins in tow
He'll go the way of his namesake
In search of an ideal home