In the back of a rented limousine,
she waved goodbye to seventeen
Said she wanted me to be her first
It was a blessing and a curse
And I was so in love with her,
the next two years are all a blur
But I still remember the pain,
as she boarded that jet plane
Her hair was pulled back tight,
tight as a black dress
took the place of cut -offs and curls
That backstreet girl of mine
Looked like a woman of the world
Well, the chapter ends, you turn the page
This town was just too small a cage
She said she had to fly while she could
And I made believe I understood
There were older men
with bank accounts
Gems and powders by the ounce
To fly her off to some distant beach
A million miles out of my reach
I hammered nails by day
That night I played the dives
While she tangled with
ambassadors in her robes
I was just a local boy,
she was a woman of the world
Then one day after thirteen years,
suddenly she reappears
Telling me she's come home to stay
She had no more dragons to slay
She said come meet me for a drink
and I must have been insane to think
She could ever really change
She sounded so familiar yet so strange
Later on that night
as I stared into her eyes
I thought I recognized
the young backstreet girl
Was she still alive inside
this woman of the world
She stayed the night and just like that
She moved into my one room flat
We just settled in to start anew
She waved goodbye to 32
And she talked about Alaskan nights
Shining in the northern lights
Sunsets on the Adriatic Sea
Bonfires on the beach
of Waikiki
We'd laze around all day
At night I played the dais
And she'd dance around
and cut off some girls
And I would thank the wind
That blew home my woman of the world
Well, the chapter ends,
you turn the page
The world is just too small a cage
She was born to look
for what can't be found
Or maybe she was just born to look around
I got a postcard in the mail today
The fifth one since she flew away
A picture of some hotel in Japan
I think I finally understand
It said, friends,
I'm flying off to Hong Kong
They say that it's the Oriental Pearl
She was nev er mine
She's a woman of the world
No, she was never mine
She's a woman of the world
You