Ninety Feet Per Second, Squared (Philippe Petit)

Lyrics

[Verse 1]
You looked
at the tallest buildings
in New York
from a dentist's office
in Paris
in a magazine
in the waiting room
and the waiting room
had the damp grey weight
of a Tuesday afternoon
that does not know
it has just ended
because the man
in the chair
has stopped
needing
his teeth fixed
and started
needing
a wire.

[Verse 2]
You spent
six years
planning
the walk.
You forged
a pass.
You hid
on the roof
overnight
with six hundred pounds
of cable
and a friend
who shot an arrow
across the gap
with fishing line
tied to the wire
tied to the cable
and the arrow
crossed the gap
between the towers
the way
a held note
crosses
the gap
between
two bars of silence
and the cable
followed
and you followed
the cable.

[Chorus]
You walked
a quarter mile
above the street
for forty-five minutes
back and forth
eight times
and you lay down
on the wire
and looked up
at the sky
and a seagull
came and circled
and the seagull
did not know
that the man
on the wire
was not
supposed to be
at seagull altitude
and you grinned
at the seagull
because the two of you
were the only ones
in the city
who were
not afraid.

[Verse 3]
The police
waited
at both ends
of the wire.
You could see
them
from the middle.
They looked
like the kind
of problem
that only exists
on solid ground
and you were
not
on solid ground
and the problem
could wait.

[Outro]
The towers
are gone now
and the wire
is gone now
and the forty-five minutes
you spent
in the air
between them
is the only part
of either building
that is still
exactly
where you
left it.

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