Breaking Skin Songtext
von Patty Griffin

In honor of the, uh, women in emotion series
I′d like to play a few songs that I've written
About some women′s issues
Um, in America there's a very serious
Domestic violence problem
Um, there's a lot of frustration and anger and
And losing of jobs these days
And people are taking a little bit of it out on women
And this is one of the songs that I′ve written about it
It′s called Breaking Skin

Who's that woman who′s hiding there?
Fears the dark and is the dark
In the dirty, strangled dress she wears
She will never own a spark

She's losing patience and
Breaking skin and
Waiting for the end of the world to begin
The world will swallow her up and then
Everyone will know her shame


Where does the arrow fly when she is gone?
Where are these broken ones coming from?
Squeeze between the ornaments on the lawn
Where is this good woman gone?

Give me the sound of empty page
Wipe my tears away in the heavy rain
To all the babies regardless of age
Everyone will know that she′s

Losing patience and
Breaking skin and
Waiting for the end of the world to begin
The world will swallow her up and then
Everyone will know her shame

Here it is and I
Give it there
And if you give me more pain
Then we'll both have a burial
Nobody′s safe and nobody's fair
Everyone will know their shame


I am losing patience and
Breaking skin and
Waiting for the end of the world to begin
The world will swallow me up and then
Everyone will know her shame

Thanks