"False Documents" lyrics - LAURIE ANDERSON
I went to a palm reader and the odd thing about the reading was that everything she told me was totally wrong. She said I loved airplanes, that I had been born in Seattle, that my mother's name was Hilary. But she seemed so sure of the information that I began to feel like I'd been walking around with these false documents permanently tattooed to my hands. It was very noisy in the parlor and members of her family kept running in and out. They were speaking a high, clicking kind of language that sounded a lot like Arabic. Books and magazines in Arabic were strewn all over the floor. It suddenly occurred to me that maybe there was a translation problem-that maybe she was reading my hand from right to left instead of left to right.
Thinking of mirrors, I gave her my other hand. Then she put her other hand out and we sat there for several minutes in what I assumed was some kind of participatory ritual. Finally I realized that her hand was out because she was waiting for money.
United States Live (1984)
- Say Hello
- Walk The Dog
- Violin Solo
- Closed Circuits
- For A Large And Changing Room
- Pictures Of It
- Language Of The Future
- Cartoon Song
- Small Voice
- Three Walking Songs
- The Healing Horn
- New Jersey Turnpike
- So Happy Birthday
- English
- Dance Of Electricity
- Three Songs For Paper, Film And Video
- Sax Solo
- Sax Duet
- Born, Never Asked
- From The Air
- Beginning French
- O Superman
- Talkshow
- Frames For The Pictures
- Democratic Way
- Looking For You
- Walking & Falling
- Private Property
- Neon Duet
- Let X=X
- The Mailman's Nightmare
- Difficult Listening Hour
- Language Is A Virus
- Reverb
- If You Can't Talk About It, Point To It
- Violin Walk
- City Song
- Finnish Farmers
- Red Map
- Hey Ah
- Bagpipe Solo
- Steven Weed
- Time And A Half
- Voices On Tape
- Example #22
- Strike
- False Documents
- New York Social Life
- A Curious Phenomenon
- Yankee See
- I Dreamed I Had To Take A Test...
- Running Dogs
- Four, Three, Two, One
- The Big Top
- It Was Up In The Mountains
- Odd Objects
- Dr. Miller
- Big Science
- Big Science Reprise
- Cello Solo
- It Tango
- Blue Lagoon
- Langue D'Amour
- Stiff Neck
- Telephone Song
- Sweaters
- We've Got Four Big Clocks
- Song For Two Jims
- Over The River
- Mach 20
- Rising Sun
- The Visitors
- The Stranger
- Classified
- Going Somewhere?
- Fireworks
- Dog Show
- Lighting Out For The Territories