Paul Shapera
Rachael
[Rachael]
One day, the walls will fall away
And in the open air, I'll race
Your rooms, your pills, your white restraints
You will choke on them, I pray

The smug scratch of your pen
Your sticky fingers in my head
And ask: how did I lose my grasp on the truth?
Was it abuse or booze that brought me to
Where girls are kept under careful lock?
Be good, or get the shock

One day, the walls will fall away
A swallowed key will buy my way
From stern and sighing white-frocked men
Who tell me, “Stop this sad pretense”
“Miss Idle's Home for Orphaned Girls
Gave you a leg-up in this world
And now, you just stain the good Alderman's name
Girls who lie will find they get put away
And kept under careful lock
Be good, or get the shock”

And all my life, the radio
Told me how it loved me so
All for me, a yearning song
A long, last love where I belong
“She's mad,” they say
“Lock her deep away”
I caught his eye the day he came
With his “Save Orphans Now!” campaign
At fifteen, I, his special girl
He showed me a new enticing world
With sweet precision, how he swept
Me off my feet and into bed
A rapturous dream, it certainly seemed
I was too young to know, to see

Until the day my cycle was late
“You will rid yourself of this,” he came to say
And when I refused, he came and accused
And swore and said here's something wrong with my head
And then they locked me away, drugged me up
Ripped my child away, and if I ever dare to say his name

All will be taken from you
All you love will go, too
Ah

And all my life, the radio
Told me how it loved me so
All for me, a yearning song
A long, last love where I belong

One day, the walls will fall away
And in the open air, I'll race