Jungleland

by Bruce Springsteen

The Rangers had a homecoming
In Harlem late last night
And the Magic Rat drove his sleek machine
Over the Jersey state line

Barefoot girl sitting on the hood of a Dodge
Drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain
The Rat pulls into town, rolls up his pants
Together they take a stab at romance
And disappear down Flamingo Lane

Well, the Maximum Lawmen run down Flamingo
Chasing the Rat and the barefoot girl
And the kids around here look just like shadows
Always quiet, holding hands

From the churches to the jails
Tonight all is silence in the world
As we take our stand
Down in Jungleland

Well, the midnight gang's assembled
And picked a rendezvous for the night
They'll meet 'neath that giant Exxon sign
That brings this fair city light

Man, there's an opera on the turnpike
There's a ballet being fought out in the alley
Until the local cop's cherry top
Rips this holy night

The street's alive as secret debts are paid
Contacts made, they vanish unseen
Kids flash guitars just like switchblades
Hustling for the record machine

The hungry and the hunted
Explode into rock and roll bands
That face off against each other out in the street
Down in Jungleland

In the parking lot
The visionaries dress in the latest rage
Inside, the backstreet girls
Are dancing to the records that the DJ plays

Lonely-hearted lovers struggle in dark corners
Desperate as the night goes on
Just one look and a whisper
And they're gone

Beneath the city, two hearts beat
Soul engines running through a night so tender
In a bedroom locked, in whispers of soft refusal
And then surrender

In the tunnels uptown, the Rat's own dream guns him down
The shots echo down them hallways in the night
No one watches as the ambulance pulls away
Or as the girl shuts out the bedroom light

Outside, the street's on fire in a real death waltz
Between what's flesh and what's fantasy
And the poets down here don't write nothing at all
They just stand back and let it all be

And in the quick of a knife
They reach for their moment and try to make an honest stand
But they wind up wounded, and not even dead
Tonight in Jungleland