How To Be A Carpenter

Aesop Rock

So you want to be a carpenter, do you?

Well it takes more than a hammer, boy, you're gonna need blueprints and a will to build, and...

Straighten your cap! you look like you've been through a war.

Wipe that grin off your mug, you got a sturdy frame?

Sluggish posture just won't cut it.

You're gonna need schooling, and, and, and take notes!

And god if I catch you yawning again you're gonna regret ever asking for my help,

And dammit you gotta hustle, this is a slacker-free zone

And, where's my pencil? go get your hard-hat,

here's a nickel, go get us a ruler and a saw and a drill and lots of graph paper...



Verse 1

Yo

I used to have a rope ladder but tattered were the rungs,

I strung it from the highest willow, trying to hug the sun.

The seventh level buckled and I tumbled from the summit,

Now I'm back to re-climb and this time light my cigarette from it.

My stitchin division to vision warfares numb enough to soak suddenly in a bullet bath

and skip stones in the morning as I,

Lie in color phantom tantrum explicable, sit and pull the petals off wild flower patches,

Magic happens!

Behold, pity the lowlife parish.

Doom City barracks left remorse coursed on a horse-drawn carriage by the torch of Polaris

To the Badlands, where every bridge collapse right where the crowd stands,

Where the witches are fireproof and every preacher's a madman.

Frigid be the appleseed demeanor towards the bay where the landshark Parliament swims

When they pause to polish they fins.

The better brains will preach the village through the city square

to the light, heavy and middle-weight integrate,

Slept with sticks and stones in my pillowcase.

Ooh my bomb's light simulator picks barnacles off the tugboat belly

Left my spirit home in a shoebox in case I die.

Got a rugged smoke-green halo floatinâ?? inches off the swamp,

Had that phase when the devil tree contacts a sparkle in my eye.

Now step back from the reservoir and let the settlers drink,

Salvage all priorities and