Yellow matter custard
Dripping from a dead dog’s eye
Crabalocker fishwife, pornographic priestess
Boy, you’ve been a naughty girl, you let your knickers down

I am the egg man
They are the egg men
I am the walrus
Goo goo g’joob

It’s gone six weeks since I last participated in Song Lyric Sunday. The website host, always somewhat chilly in his comments on my posts, expressed clear displeasure with the last one.

“You seem to be determined to go against the grain, Jeff… disappointing.” His prompt for the week was to write about a song featuring wind instruments. I couldn’t think of any I liked; I took a different path that week. I wrote about a cello.

I never felt at home leaving pingbacks on his site. I used his prompts as starting points for stories, my own stories. Most of the other writers gave a synopsis of a song or a band distilled from Wikipedia or the website songfacts.com. I see that as a research assignment, not a writer’s prompt. Instead, I told long, rambling, personal tales inspired by a song.

Susan suggested maybe this game wasn’t a good fit for me, maybe I should stop playing. I reluctantly agreed. Now it should be out of sight, out of mind, right? Well, no. My blogger friend Angie plays every week. I always see her post and then comment on her blog about which song I would have used to satisfy the prompt.

Today, Angie killed it. The prompt was to write about a song with nonsense lyrics. She picked Welcome Christmas, the song played twice in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Not only is it instantly recognizable (Fah-who foris, dah-who doris…), but it’s also seasonally relevant. In this case, I didn’t tell Angie my song choice, instead, I thought “well damn, now I want to play.”

Last night, Susan, Eli and I started watching The Beatles: Get Back, an eight-hour documentary of the Fab Four recording their 1970 album Let It Be. Suffice it to say we’ve all got the Beatles on our brains today. At around 10:30, as the morning laze wound down, and we all started thinking about how we might productively spend the day, Eli asked Spotify to play the Beatles. His phone, amplified by a Bluetooth speaker, launched into the orchestral string introduction of I Am the Walrus.

Forty-six years ago, when I stopped consuming music from 45 RPM singles, and started buying LP record albums, the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour was one of the first I bought. I listened to the Beatles frequently as a preteen, they were still releasing music, and Magical Mystery Tour had plenty of familiar radio hits on it: Penny Lane, the Fool on the Hill and Strawberry Fields Forever. Because of this, I felt sure it was their best album.

I love the album, beginning to end, but my favorite cut has always been I Am the Walrus. The simple driving beat, the catchy tune and the tongue-twister lyrics hooked me immediately. Just like the Song Lyric Sunday prompt requires, the words are nonsense. Do they mean anything? I can’t say. I’ve known all the lyrics almost my whole life, I’ve never discerned any message. They’re fun, they’re confusing, beautiful, menacing, clever. The song feels like a journey. Continually crossing into new realms with growing urgency as it moves towards its conclusion. The final fade-away is filled with haughty mumbling, which today I learned someone has taken the time to decipher and is printed in the lyrics below.

That the words probably mean nothing is irrelevant. It’s a great song, and I share it with you now. Take four minutes to listen and read along. I promise it will brighten your day.

I am he as you are he as you are me
And we are all together
See how they run like pigs from a gun
See how they fly
I’m crying

Sitting on a corn flake
Waiting for the van to come
Corporation T-shirt, stupid bloody Tuesday
Man you’ve been a naughty boy
You let your face grow long

I am the egg man
They are the egg men
I am the walrus
Goo goo g’joob

Mister City policeman sitting
Pretty little policemen in a row
See how they fly like Lucy in the sky, see how they run
I’m crying, I’m crying
I’m crying, I’m crying

Yellow matter custard
Dripping from a dead dog’s eye
Crabalocker fishwife, pornographic priestess
Boy, you’ve been a naughty girl, you let your knickers down

I am the egg man
They are the egg men
I am the walrus
Goo goo g’joob

Sitting in an English garden
Waiting for the sun
If the sun don’t come you get a tan
From standing in the English rain

I am the egg man (now good sir)
They are the egg men (a poor man, made tame to fortune’s blows)
I am the walrus
Goo goo g’joob, goo goo goo g’joob (good pity)

Expert, texpert choking smokers
Don’t you think the joker laughs at you (ho ho ho, hee hee hee, hah hah hah)
See how they smile like pigs in a sty, see how they snide
I’m crying

Semolina Pilchard
Climbing up the Eiffel tower
Elementary penguin singing Hare Krishna
Man, you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allen Poe

I am the egg man
They are the egg men
I am the walrus

Goo goo g’joob, goo goo goo g’joob
Goo goo g’joob, goo goo goo g’joob, goo
Joob, joob, jooba
Jooba, jooba, jooba
Joob, jooba
Joob, jooba

Umpa, umpa, stick it up your jumper (jooba, jooba)
Umpa, umpa, stick it up your jumper
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)
Everybody’s got one (stick it up your jumper)
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)
Everybody’s got one (stick it up your jumper)
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)
Everybody’s got one (stick it up your jumper)
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)
Everybody’s got one (stick it up your jumper)
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)
Everybody’s got one (stick it up your jumper)
Everybody’s got one (umpa, umpa)

Slave
Thou hast slain me
Villain, take my purse
If I ever
Bury my body
The letters which though find’st about me
To Edmund Earl of Gloucester
Seek him out upon the British Party
O untimely death
I know thee well
A serviceable villain, as duteous to the vices of thy mistress
As badness would desire
What, is is he dead?
Sit you down, Father, rest you