Tulip - Jesca Hoop

Ada, my rarest bulb from the desert valley

Your hair of fire and skin of snow

Have caused me to the heights of the desert mountains

In search of the cure for a rampant fever

Your beauty’s power, it plagues me now

I come and scour the land for the desert flower

For beauty and perfume

I’d stake my house and my lands

The gold is sleeping in the river

But the flower’s in my hand

With a paler leaf and a broken petal

I’ll bait the king and queen

And to the goldsmith with my flower

I’ll buy a wedding ring

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

Oxen, sheep and wheat and rye

And land on the north seaside

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

The finest dresses man could buy

And a pearl for to bait my bride

Then with my rarest bulb to her father’s garden

And like gold for lamb or wool for clam

I gave that man a bulb for his daughter Ada

Your heart is mine and it’s mine forever

And she replied, «My faith that lies on yon horizon’s

Tethered me to the sky»

The match arranged and vows exchanged

And the dove flew away

The bells spilled out the hollow canyon

On our wedding day

To me, she gave her hand until

Death do us part

But the bird will nest with one that she has

Promised her heart

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

The bed from which our sons will rise

And the window where she cries

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

A net to catch the birds that fly

From the window where she cries

He reaches out and I withdraw

Spilling the flowering bribes from his paw

The broken petals climbing the walls

Stealing my oxygen, no air at all

From the bed, I hear him call

But I answer cooing when the night falls

The cotton sword is storming the hall

Cutting my vision to no sight at all

I tied the tulip around her neck like a red lead sinker

And blindfold and spin her 'round and 'round and 'round

To the banks of the river

And then walk my true love into the rushing water

And by her long hair, bleeding red hair

Pull my love there under until she drown

For beauty and perfume

I’d stake my house and my land

My love is sleeping in the river

But the flower’s in my hand

With a paler leaf and a broken petal

I’ll keep her all to me

And to the river with my flower

I’ll hear my true love sing

No water is still in my friend

Ready to drown

Water, water, oh water my kin

Carry me out

This iron river is mercy at last

Die as she laughs

For he is waiting where the doves nest

My true love

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

The veil that parted over my bride

And her breath as my true love dies

Tulip, tulip, with one what I did buy

The veil that parted over my bride

And the blue from her bluest eyes