Last of the Window Cleaners

歌詞

I was the last of the window-cleaners I was sacrificed as such When they singled out the ring-leaders They said I'd seen too much But I only saw what the butler did The chambermaid also I only saw how the other half lived I just washed their windows Maybe up my ladder I got ideas above my station Seldom if ever had a working man had a higher education I learned to value clarity And that knowledge is a two-way thing That when windows attain transparency working men get a good look in But times are bad for window-cleaners Worse than the 1930s If it's not cowboys and amateurs Who don't know where the dirt is It's our most powerful customers Who'll wipe us out eventually They've lost the taste for clarity In the late 20th century They took away our permits And imposed a window tax People became like hermits Sitting in their pitch black flats And though we remained intransigent And our pride in the work lived on There was a series of mysterious accidents And we died off one by one I was the last of the window-cleaners After the union was smashed They found the corpses of the other ring leaders Their fingers had been crushed I received anonymous letters threatening attack They struck at the Limehouse dock Up drew a horse-drawn hackney cab It was well past twelve o'clock Out came a man with a lantern Saying he'd come to light me to bed Saying something to do with a chopper And something to do with my head But I wasn't listening carefully There were other things on my mind The failure of the union The future of mankind He spread his frock coat flat on the quay And began positioning me there Laid me back almost tenderly and flourished a butcher's cleaver I shouted past him into the dark 'We're prepared to make concessions' But the blade he twisted in my heart Ended my profession But times are bad for window-cleaners Worse than the 1930s If it's not cowboys and amateurs Who don't know where the dirt is It's our most powerful customers Who'll wipe us out eventually They've lost the taste for clarity In the late 20th century