Stephen Schwartz
Out There
[QUASIMODO]
Safe behind these windows and these parapets of stone
Gazing at the people down below me
All my life I watch them as I hide up here alone
Hungry for the histories they'd show me
All my life I memorize their faces
Knowing them as they will never know me
All my life I wonder how it feels to pass a day
Not above them but part of them

And out there living in the sun
Give me one
Day out there. All I ask is one
To hold forever
Out there, where they all live unaware
What I'd give, what I'd dare
Just to live one day out there

Out there, among the millers and the weavers and their wives
Through the roofs and gables, I can see them
Every day, they shout and scold and go about their lives
Heedless of the gift it is to be them

If I were in their skin
I treasure every instant
Out there strolling by the Seine
Taste a morning
Out there like ordinary men
Who freely walk
About there. Just one day and then, I swear
I'll be content with my share
Won't resent. Won't despair
Old and bent? I won't care
I'll have spent one day out there