[Verse 1] The restaurant lost its private room The day before my mother's feast My brother found a roll of string And called the family from the street We borrowed tables from the school And swept the lot behind the store By dusk a line of paper lanterns Made a ceiling out of open air [Pre-Chorus] She thought we'd canceled all the plans Then saw her name in our own hands [Chorus] Paper lantern parking lot Look what we can make from what we've got Four long tables, one big cake Every chair a friend who stayed The good light isn't hard to find When we hang it up ourselves tonight Paper lantern parking lot We found the party after all [Verse 2] My uncle carried in the folding chairs And put the crooked one by him The baker saved the strawberry cake With icing smudged along its rim Mom told a story from her twenties That none of us had heard before We passed the last slice down the table As the lanterns swung above the cars [Chorus] Paper lantern parking lot Look what we can make from what we've got Four long tables, one big cake Every chair a friend who stayed The good light isn't hard to find When we hang it up ourselves tonight Paper lantern parking lot We found the party after all [Instrumental - mandolin and piano, eight bars] [Bridge] At cleanup Mom kept one red lantern Folded flat against her coat She said, next year, if the room is open Let's still do it out here, though [Final Chorus] Paper lantern parking lot Look what we can make from what we've got Four long tables, one big cake Every chair a friend who stayed The good light isn't hard to find When we hang it up ourselves tonight Paper lantern parking lot This is the party we'll recall [Outro] The last red lantern crossed our yard And stayed above her kitchen door.
