Lyr Req: Pocahontas (Neil Young)

Subject: Neil Young's 'Pocahontas'
From: allanwill
Date: 04 Oct 04 - 01:17 AM

I know Neil is a touchy subject here, but this is a serious question. In all the transcriptions I've seen of the song "Pocahontas" there are the lines "They massacred the buffalo, kitty-corner from the bank".

I've read the thread that explains that kitty-corner means (basically) diagonally opposite, but is this the meaning Neil is conveying in those lines, or is it a misinterpretation that is being perpetuated.

Allan

Subject: ADDPOP: POCAHONTAS (Neil Young)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 04 Oct 04 - 10:33 PM

I suppose it would be a good idea to post the lyrics. I found them here: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/neilyoung/pocahontas.html
I don't think "kitty-corner could have any other meaning in the U.S., orther than "catty-wumpus" (diagonal). It seems like a child's phrase to me, not something a terminally cool guy like Neil Young would use.
-Joe Offer-

POCAHONTAS
(Neil Young)

Aurora borealis
The icy sky at night
Paddles cut the water
In a long and hurried flight
From the white man
to the fields of green
And the homeland
We've never seen.

They killed us in our tepee
And they cut our women down
They might have left some babies
Cryin' on the ground
But the firesticks
and the wagons come
And the night falls
on the setting sun.

They massacred the buffalo
Kitty corner from the bank
The taxis run across my feet
And my eyes have turned to blanks
In my little box
at the top of the stairs
With my Indian rug
and a pipe to share.

I wish a was a trapper
I would give thousand pelts
To sleep with Pocahontas
And find out how she felt
In the mornin'
on the fields of green
In the homeland
we've never seen.

And maybe Marlon Brando
Will be there by the fire
We'll sit and talk of Hollywood
And the good things there for hire
And the Astrodome
and the first tepee
Marlon Brando, Pocahontas and me
Marlon Brando, Pocahontas and me
Pocahontas.