Rags or Satin - Lisa Garrison
Rags or satin, should I stay in Manhattan
Where the landlords fatten and the poor grow more lean?
I could save a token if I move to Hoboken
Or relocate upstate and find some air that is clean.
Cross the Brooklyn Bridge, try the Heights or Bay Ridge
Where brownstone buyers are speculating.
For a change of scenes I could move out to Queens
And live over my means just renovating.
Landlord, he just wants to raise my rent
Realtor just wants her seventeen percent.
I can't even afford a tenement.
I don't know where my money got spent.
If I only had a tent! (But all I've got is...)
Pain and angst! Should I move to the Bronx
And join the ranks of Sweat Equity?
I've been looking a lot, and I would sublet or squat
If I could just find a spot without a fixture fee.
I'm tired of trying, and I'm getting quite violent
Wandering through Staten Island for a place to sleep.
I've been more than thorough checking out the five boroughs
For a home or a hovel with a rent that's cheap.
Mister, you can keep your parquet floor.
I'm willing to settle for windows and a door.
Just a place to hang my hat, I don't need more
Or less than an address and a lease that's secure
(Is there anything secure?)
Rags or satin, should I stay in Manhattan
Where I'll surely be flattened when inflation takes its toll?
If I had any luck, I'd be saving my bucks
But I'm ten years too late to get on rent control.
© 1983 by lisa Garrison (BMI)
"One of my more unusual interactions with the library of Congress came as a result of this song. In 1979 during a "raggedy" time I wrote this song and registered it for copyright. Six months later I received a letter from the copyright office stating that my check had bounced.
However, they told me, they had registered the song anyway. Now, would I please send another check to cover the fee. So I did."