The wands of smoke are rising
From the walls of the Bastille
And through the streets of Paris

Runs a sense of the unreal

The Kings have all departed

There servants are nowhere
We burned out their mansions
In the name of Robespierre


And still we wait
To see the day begin

Our time is wasting in the wind
Wondering why
Wondering why, it echoes

Through the lonely palace of Versailles

Inside the midnight councils

The lamps are burning low
On you sit and talk all through the night
But there's just no place to go


And Bonaparte is coming
With his army from the south

Marat your days are numbered
And we live hand to mouth


While we wait
To see the day begin
Our time is wasting in the wind

Wondering why
Wondering why, it echoes
Through the lonely palace of Versailles


The ghost of revolution
Still prowls the Paris streets

Down all the restless centuries
It wonders incomplete


It speaks inside the cheap red wine
Of cafe summer nights
Its red and amber voices

Call the cars at traffic lights

Why do you wait

To see the day begin
Your time is wasting in the wind
Wondering why

Wondering why, it echoes
Through the lonely palace of Versailles


Wondering why, it echoes
Through the lonely palace of Versailles