///*****/// [Intro] A payphone in the rain And a number I still know [Verse 1] I was seventeen and certain That the world was mine to take And you stood there in the driveway With a paper bag of cake And you did not try to stop me Though your hands were holding tight And I drove off in that Buick Underneath the porch light I did not look in the mirror Because I could not bear to see A woman getting smaller While she still believed in me [Pre-Chorus] And I sent you almost nothing For a hard and stupid year Every word I could have written Every word you did not hear [Chorus] So these are letters to my mother From a man she barely knows Every sorry I was too proud for Every kindness that I owe I am writing from a hotel With the curtains going grey And I have got the words together Twenty-seven years too late These are letters to my mother [Verse 2] You worked the early shift at Mercy And the late shift at the mill And you never once complained of it And I do not think you will There was one dress for the winter And a coat you would not buy And a boy who had a leather jacket And who never wondered why And I thought that you were ordinary Like the wallpaper and rain God forgive the eyes of children And return them all again [Pre-Chorus] Because you were the extraordinary Thing that held the roof And I called it just my childhood When it was your whole youth [Chorus] So these are letters to my mother From a man she barely knows Every sorry I was too proud for Every kindness that I owe I am writing from a hotel With the curtains going grey And I have got the words together Twenty-seven years too late These are letters to my mother [Verse 3] There is a boy asleep down the hallway With my jaw and with your eyes And he thinks that I am ordinary And I hope he does for a while Because one day he will leave here With a paper bag of cake And I will stand there in the driveway And I will not say wait And I will understand you finally In a way I could not then And I will love you at that moment More than I have ever been [Pre-Chorus] So I am putting down the stamp And I am walking to the box And I am not going to wait for Any more forgiving clocks [Bridge] If your mother is still living Go and call her from the road Do not save it for the ending Do not carry it alone Every phone booth in the country Is a road that leads back home [Guitar Solo] [Final Chorus] So these are letters to my mother From a man who finally knows Every sorry he was too proud for Every kindness that he owes I am writing from the highway With the morning going gold And I have got the words together And I am sending them home These are letters to my mother [Coda] And if the answer never comes And if the line goes still I will keep on writing to you And I think I always will Because a house is just a building And a name is just a sound But a woman in a driveway Is the only holy ground [Outro] A payphone in the rain And a number I still know And it is ringing And it is ringing
