The vending machine is blinking in code The bus stop map is pointing nowhere A plastic bag performs for nobody The audience is a traffic light Number twenty-seven has a blue front door Number twenty-eight has two front doors Number twenty-nine is permanently dark Like it's hiding from the rest of the street A cat sits perfectly still on a wall Like it's waiting for something important I wait too, for absolutely nothing Then forget what I was waiting for Every lit window Looks like a secret Every closed curtain Looks like a mistake Ringing doorbells Just to hear them sing One short conversation With absolutely anything Ringing doorbells Half past who-knows-when Maybe this one opens Maybe not again No answer Wrong house Keep moving Somebody parked a shopping cart in a tree Like they'd run out of earth halfway through A garden gnome is missing from the lawn The neighbours look suspiciously relaxed A television flickers through the blinds Three people cheering at something invisible I cheer too from the pavement outside For reasons I don't need explained Every porch light Starts a rumour Every side street Starts another one Ringing doorbells Just to hear them sing One short conversation With absolutely anything Ringing doorbells Half past who-knows-when Maybe this one opens Maybe not again A fox crosses the road Without looking either way Somewhere a bottle falls over Nobody reacts A sprinkler suddenly starts And so does everybody else The city keeps inventing reasons To take the long way home The city keeps changing its mind Every twenty seconds Ringing doorbells Just to hear them sing One short conversation With absolutely anything Ringing doorbells Half past who-knows-when Maybe this one opens Maybe not again Ringing doorbells Round the block once more Following bright sounds Through every open door Ringing doorbells Nothing left to prove Just another strange night With somewhere else to move Wrong street Good idea Wrong street Better idea One more corner One more light One more doorbell Goodnight
