Joanna Newsom – Sawdust And Diamonds (Guitar)

Capo 3
Key
-
Versions (2)

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Chords

[Verse 1]
                C
From the top of the flight

Em              C
Of the wide white stairs

Em              C
Through the rest of my life

Em              C
Do you wait for me there?

Em              C
There's a bell in my ears

Em              C
There's the wide white roar

Em              C
Drop a bell down the stairs

Em              C
Hear it fall forever mor

Em              C
Hear it fall forevermore
[Chorus] G Em
G               Em
Drop a bell off of the dock

G               Em
Blot it out in the sea

G               Em
Drowning mute as a rock

G               Em
sounding mutiny

G
There's a light in the wings, hits this system of strings,

                            Em
from the side while they swing;
See the wires, the wires, the wires. [Verse]
G
And the articulation in our elbows and knees

Em
Makes us buckle and we couple in endless increase
As the audience admires
G
And the little white dove
Made with love, made with love
Em
Made with glue and a glove and some pliers

G
Swings a low sickle arc from its perch in the dark

Em
Settle down, settle down my desire
[Chorus]
D
And the moment I slept

C                       G
I was swept up in a terrible tremor

D                               C
Though no longer bereft, how I shook

                 Em
And i couldn't remember

D
And then the furthermost shake

Am
Drove a murdering stake in

C               Em             G
And cleft me right down through my center

D
And I shouldn't say so

C                       Em
But I know that it was then or never

G               Em
Push me back into a tree

G               Em
Bind my buttons with salt

G               Em
Fill my long ears with bees

G
Braying 'please, please, please,

                Em
Oh you ought not!
No you ought not!'
G
And then the system of strings tugs on the tip of my wings

                             Em
Cut from cardboard and old magazines
Makes me warble and rise like a sparrow.
G
And in the place where I stood
There is a circle of wood
                         Em
A quarter to which you chop and you stack in your barrow

G
And it is terribly good
To carry water and chop wood
                          Em
Streaked with soot, heavy booted and wild-eyed

G
As I crash through the rafters
And the ropes and the pulleys trail after
                                        Em
And the holiest, holiest belfry burns sky high
[Verse]
D
And then a slow lip of fire

C                       G
Moves across the prairie with precision

                                        C
While somewhere with your pliers and glue

                                     Em
You make your first incision

D                       A
And in a moment of almost unbearable vision

C                       Em                     G
Doubled over with the hunger of lions

D
'Hold me close', cooed the dove

          C                             Em
Who was stuffed now with sawdust and diamonds
[Chorus] Em D G
A       C      G
I wanted to say 'why the long face?'

A            C                         G
Sparrow perch and play songs of long face

A        C             G
Burro buck and bray songs of long face

                     Am                 C
Sings 'i will swallow your sadness and eat your cold clay

G
Just to lift your long face

A                               C
And though it may be madness, I will take to the grave

G
Your precious long face

A                                       C
& though our bones they may break & our souls separate

G
Why the long face?

                        A               C
And though our bodies recoil from the grip of the soil

G
Why the long face?
[Bridge]
G                             Em
In the trough of the waves

G                             Em
Which are pawing like dogs

G                             Em
Pitch we, pale-faced and grave

G                             Em
As I write in my log.

G                             Em
Then I hear a noise from the hull

G                             Em
Seven days out to sea

G                             Em
And it is the damnable bell

G
And it tolls, I believe, that it tolls

              Em
It tolls for me!
And it tolls for me!
G
And though my wrists and my waist
Seem so easy to break
              Em
Still my dear I would've walked you to the edge of the water

G
And they will recognize all the lines of your face

              Em
In the face of the daughter, of the daughter, of my daughter

G
And darling we will be fine
But what was yours and mine
Em
Appears to be a sandcastle that the gibbering wave takes

G
But if it's all just the same
Then say my name, say my name,
Em
in the morning so that i know when the wave breaks
[Chorus]
D
I wasn't born of a whistle

C                       G
Or milked from a thistle at twilight

D
No, i was all horns and thorns

                    C                                   Em
Sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright

D                       A
So enough of this terror we deserve to know light

C               Em             G
And grow evermore lighter and lighter

D
You would have seen me through

C               Em
But I could not undo that desire
[Coda]
D       C      Em
Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh desire

D       C      Em
Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh desire

D       C      Em
Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh desire

Em              C
From the top of the flight

Em              C
Of the wide white stairs

Em              C
Through the rest of my life

Em              C
Do you wait for me there?