One night my wonderful friend Eric Stand asked if I would accompany him to pick up a friend of his, Stephie Bershad, and drive her home to Brooklyn. I agreed and when we got to her house (Union St.?) I met her roommate, Jane Teller, who was sitting at the kitchen table. I developed an immediate interest for this exotically pretty, super smart and funny, and definitely offbeat woman. We would spend many hours at that kitchen table in the months that followed, in many a fanciful mental excursion. I’ve never had conversations quite like that again, but they, like her, were addictive. I’m reasonably certain she liked me a fair amount, but I certainly didn’t generate any romantic sparks with her. Even so, hope springs eternal, and over the course of our friendship I wrote her two songs. She was a wonderful poet, and on a bulletin board in that kitchen was a short poem of hers which ended with the line: And the frog was naked. This song was originally entitled: Confessions of a Naked Frog.
Lyrics
Tell Me Jane
Brown leaves of autumn toasted in summer’s heat
Swirling up, floating down, everywhere that I am
Brown leaves of autumn cluttering up the street
Perfectly oblivious to temperature and time
Now I didn’t wade through
Twenty feet of snow
Sunsets at four
And ten degrees below
Just to find summer’s gone before it has begun
While I slept through the whole bloody run
Will you, won’t you please explain
What goes on, tell me Jane
Spring will be on its way and then
I’ll be left wondering when
I’ll get this chance again
What goes on, you should know, tell me Jane
Sat on a toadstool, gurgling quietly
Happily wondering while it’s still allowed
Searched for a mushroom, settled on a canapé
Perfectly oblivious to parasols and clouds
This was my system season after season
I was an anomaly, a frog without a reason
Now my shadow is gone before it has begun
And I still wonder what’s with the sun
Will you, won’t you please explain
What goes on, tell me Jane
Spring will be on its way and then
I’ll be left wondering when
I’ll get this chance again
What goes on, you should know, tell me Jane
Played for the maestro my timpani symphony
Never for a moment thinking I might be denied
Played for the maestro and she expressed her sympathy
Doctor Gloom went Boom!Boom!Boom! and then broke down and cried
And so we disbanded (if you’ll excuse the pun)
I joined the croaking chorus while the doctor chose to run
All he left was the captivating rhythm of his drum
And the tune he’d mysteriously hum
Will you, won’t you please explain
What goes on, tell me Jane
Spring will be on its way and then
I’ll be left wondering when
I’ll get this chance again
What goes on, you should know
Tell me Jane.