The soldier came knocking upon the queen's door
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He said, "I am not fighting for you any more"
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The queen knew she'd seen his face someplace before
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And slowly she let him inside.
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He said, "I've watched your palace up here on the hill
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And I've wondered who's the woman for whom we all kill
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But I am leaving tomorrow and you can do what you will
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Only first I am asking you why."
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Down in the long narrow hall he was led
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Into her rooms with her tapestries red
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And she never once took the crown from her head
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She asked him there to sit down.
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He said, "I see you now, and you are so very young
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But I've seen more battles lost than I have battles won
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And I've got this intuition, says it's all for your fun
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And now will you tell me why?"
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The young queen, she fixed him with an arrogant eye
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She said, "You won't understand, and you may as well not try"
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But her face was a child's, and he thought she would cry
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But she closed herself up like a fan.
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And she said, "I've swallowed a secret burning thread
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It cuts me inside, and often I've bled"
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He laid his hand then on top of her head
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And he bowed her down to the ground.
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"Tell me how hungry are you? How weak you must feel
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As you are living here alone, and you are never revealed
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But I won't march again on your battlefield"
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And he took her to the window to see.
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And the sun, it was gold, though the sky, it was gray
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And she wanted more than she ever could say
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But she knew how it frightened her, and she turned away
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And would not look at his face again.
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And he said, "I want to live as an honest man
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To get all I deserve and to give all I can
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And to love a young woman who I don't understand
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Your highness, your ways are very strange."
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But the crown, it had fallen, and she thought she would break
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And she stood there, ashamed of the way her heart ached
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She took him to the doorstep and she asked him to wait
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She would only be a moment inside.
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Out in the distance her order was heard
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And the soldier was killed, still waiting for her word
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And while the queen went on strangeling in the solitude she preferred
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The battle continued on
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The Queen And The Soldier
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Suzanne Vega |