Paul Simon Lyrics

Album: Songs From Capeman

Can I Forgive Him Lyrics

ESMERALDA

 I am Esmeralda Agr髇, Se駉ra.

 I know I've no right to speak.

 My son is not the savage boy you see,

 The cape, the sneer, the slicked-back hair

 It hides the child I nursed and bathed, Se駉ra.

 Please don't turn your eyes from me

 Your son, gone to God, and mine to blame

 My fated son,

 He too is gone

 The state will see to that, I am sure, Se駉ra

 The state will see to that, I am sure.

 1ST MOTHER

 You Spanish people, you come to this country

 Nothing here changes your lives

 Ungrateful immigrants asking for pity

 When all of your answers are knives

 This city makes a cartoon of a crime

 Capes and umbrellas the glorification of slime

 I have to face this horror, Se駉ra.

 2ND MOTHER

 My religion

 Asks me to pray for the murderer's soul

 But I think you'd have to be

 Jesus on the cross

 To open your heart after such a loss

 Can I forgive him?

 Can I forgive him?

 No, I cannot

 Can I forgive him

 No, I cannot

 Friends become strangers

 Compassion is hard to express in words

 The trembling flowers they bring

 Fear in the roots and the stem

 What happened to me they know could happen to them.

 Can I forgive him

 No, I cannot

 Can I forgive him

 No

 ESMERALDA

 Only God can say 'Forgive'

 His son too received a knife

 But we go on, we have to live

 With this cross we call our life

 1ST MOTHER

 Feels like a bomb fell

 And wave after wave come the aftershocks

 2ND MOTHER

 You can't believe that it's true

 There must be some mistake

 You drift through this nightmare from which you can't wake

 BOTH MOTHERS

 Can I forgive him?

 Can I forgive him,

 No, I cannot

 Can I forgive him?

 Can I forgive him, no, I cannot

 Can I forgive him?

 Can I forgive him, no, I cannot

 Can I forgive him

 No, I cannot.


 Lead Vocal, Acoustic Guitar-Paul Simon

 Recorded at Paul Simon's home