California's a raw deal,
Would you deny, would you deny,
would you deny it?
They're selling everything they can steal,
Do you wanna buy, do you wanna buy,
do you wanna buy it?

They're kicking out everyone
the boot can reach,
And they're charging us to cling to the ankles
They're building castles on a shrinking beach
And they're telling themselves that it's stable

And in this land of earthquakes and no weather
I have been planning the rest of
all of our lives together
We can't keep keeping on
Giving what little we get
to some development Don

I'm not inclined to keep kissing the ring
And our cat keeps pissing on things,
Means they know that
home's just a place where there's me
When you can see all the cages
is it strange to want to feel free?

Philly, PA is all right with me
Do you wanna go, do you wanna go,
do you wanna go there?
Where we can pay for our privacy,
Do you wanna go, do you wanna go,
do you wanna go there?
We can sequester some space to share
Do you wanna share, do you wanna share,
do you wanna share it
The time's closing in, I think the place is there
They're bringing down the stick,
Here's the carrot

And the folks here,
well the ones we engage with
They act like they're on stage
and there's no one that I want to age with
They're strangers in arms
Presentations are cool
and their presence lukewarm

And I might not seem so hot and so frigid
Where summer days swelter
and winters freeze city streets rigid
Is where I want to be
When you can see all the cages
It’s strange to think you could ever feel free

We've got more of a choice than the rest,
And I know it's depressing to lose it
But right now's our chance
to choose for the best,
And I've learned when you get a chance
then you use it

The work is the same wherever you go
All that changes are the ways in which you do it
The fight goes on without end and so
You gotta hold on
To whatever gets you through it

And I know that it's needless to say
The way commands lose their meaning
when you’ve learned how to hear and obey
But it's like finding a rhyme
To see structures and forces
and to hope at the same time
And I've laughed more in a month than a year
You go hunting to learn something
and you carry it here
Is it revealing a path to you and me
Or just concealing the difference
between feeling and really being free?