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Gingerlady

Posted by ESC on August 26, 2001

In Reply to: Gingerlady posted by Colin on August 25, 2001

: : My best guess: the songwriter is talking about hallucinating somebody on waking up. Maybe he calls her "gingerlady" just because that sounds exotic; maybe (a farther-out guess) she looks like a cookie, a gingerbread man but female.

: : None of this seems obvious to me.

: The 'obvious' reference is to a red-haired woman.

Maybe the gingerlady is a whiskey bottle.

A RAINY NIGHT IN SOHO
I've been loving you a long time
Down all the years, down all the days
And I've cried for all your troubles
Smiled at your funny little ways
We watched our friends grow up together
And we saw them as they fell
Some of them fell into Heaven
Some of them fell into Hell

I took shelter from a shower
And I stepped into your arms
On a rainy night in Soho
The wind was whistling all its charms
I sang you all my sorrows
You told me all your joys
Whatever happened to that old song
To all those little girls and boys

Now the song is nearly over
We may never find out what it means
But there's a light I hold before me
And you're the measure of my dreams
The measure of my dreams

Sometimes I wake up in the morning
The gingerlady by my bed
Covered in a cloak of silence
I hear you in my head
I'm not singing for the future
I'm not dreaming of the past
I'm not talking of the fist time
I never think about the last

Now the song is nearly over
We may never find out what it means
Still there's a light I hold before me
You're the measure of my dreams
The measure of my dreams

Copyright 1991, Shane MacGowan

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