Peking Duck Lyrics


These are the lyrics to the student-written play/musical, "Peking Duck", performed October 10, 1998 in the Zellerbach Theatre at the University of Pennsylvania.


Just Looking at You
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Yumi Kim

Just looking at you, the whole world claims a hue
Purer than the snow and clearer than the blue
This one feeling nothing can subdue
Just one look and I belong to you

Swans playing the harp and sparrows on the flute
Squirrels playing chimes and kittens on the lute
We the singers centered on the stage
Harmonize with children half our age

Lock and key, dock and sea
How much closer can two hearts be?
All I need is all I see
And it's you alone I see

Just looking at you, the skies turn clear and fair
Dreams are not so far and angels not so rare
This one feeling nothing can subdue
Just one look and I belong to you


Time to Cry
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Andrea Chan
Time to cry all alone
Memories not worth memory
Gentle hearts, songs of joy
Just don't apply to me

Guardian angel, when will you arrive?
Will my torn heart learn to smile while I'm alive?

Here I stand, here I wait
Not knowing what I wait for
Heaven rise, heaven fall
It makes no difference any more

It makes no difference any more


I Am She
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Ann Ming Yeh & Wesley Chu

Rain or shine or fog or cloud
All alone or in a crowd
I hear the sign
Of sweet uncovered news

Flowers grown through sun and rain
Paint and shade the canvas plain
Walls that confine
They're just there to confuse

There, in a million faces
Lovers find each other, winking their eyes and linking their fingers
Bolts of love light the nearest future
And blinds us from anything impure

Our eyes wide and seeing what they allow
Our eyes guide our hearts to a midnight vow
The little girl lost in dream
Look at me, I am she

Rain or shine or fog or cloud
All alone or in a crowd
I hear the sign
Of sweet uncovered news

Flowers grown through sun and rain
Paint and shade the canvas plain
Walls that confine
They're just there too confuse

Our eyes wide and seeing what they allow
Our eyes guide our hearts to a midnight vow
The little girl/boy
Lost in dream
Look at me
I am she/he

The little girl
The perfect girl
The timid fool
The royal jewel
Could it be?
I am she


Aix Galericulata
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto

**NOTE: This song was cut from the show.

You don't know what we are all about
No one knows we're just a little bit endangered
Someone's got to tell you what we're about
You oughtta know what we ducks have endured

Before you complain, let me just explain
The ABCs of my specie and me
Us males are drakes and the gals are ducks
We live in lakes and we travel in flocks

We're not just birds with flat bills, short necks
Our feet are webbed and our feathers are waterproof
We don't just quack, we can whistle too
Our wings aren't decoration we can really fly

Aix galariculata
Aix galericulata
The Mandarin duck
Aix galericulata

We don't live long, you're really old if you're ten
Most ducks are grannies by the age of two
So give us some respect, let us breathe our oxygen
How would you feel if you died in first grade?

Aix galariculata
Aix galericulata
The Mandarin duck
Aix galericulata

Aix galariculata
Aix galericulata
The Mandarin duck
Aix galericulata


Aix Galericulata 2
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Tak Okamoto

(Spoken) I'm free! I'm free! I'm...free. But all my friends are still going to get roasted! I'm starting to feel so upset about this whole thing...why don't you humans understand what you're doing? How would you like to have your head chopped off? Be floured and have your chest painted with brown sticky sauce? Grilled at 350 for an hour on a stick? Then getting your half-burnt leg bitten off, chewed, swallowed and digested? Then someone being so happy about doing that to you, that they do the same to your butt? Ugh!

You don't know what we are all about
You don't know we're just a little bit endangered
You don't know what we are all about
You don't know what we ducks have endured

Getting chased by cooks and knives
All day and all night, and then the very next day
Lacking food, needing air, wanting love and sleep
There's no one to depend on; they all want us dead

All we ask is to let us be
But your taste buds control you, and you slay women and kids
Do you know how it feels to weep for one of your kind
Do you know that this is murder, are you out of your mind?

Please...don't eat me
Bees...give you honey
Seeds...taste better
Cheese...even better

The Aix Galericulata
The Mandarin duck belongs in lakes
The Aix Galericulata
Return to the ducks their Mandarin drakes

Please...don't eat me
Fleas...I have twenty
Peas...vitamin Bs
Trees...grow cherries

The Aix Galericulata
The Mandarin duck belongs in lakes
The Aix Galericulata
Return to the ducks their Mandarin drakes


Boys
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Melissa Chan, Ann Ming Yeh, & Tak Okamoto

Some boys are cute
That boy was cute
Some boys are not so cute

Some boys are brave
That boy was brave
Some boys are not so brave

Some boys think they are strong
That boy was really strong
Most boys think they are strong and they are wrong

Boys need help and need a woman's care
Their heads are filled with ego and hot air
Boys just live for one thing then they tell (their friends)
Most of them don't even do it well

They live for us but they don't realize
That that's why God made guys
No, we don't mind, they're so cute cuz they're dumb
They look so shy when they...


Finale
Music & Lyrics by Tak Okamoto
Performed by Peking Duck Cast

Why can't we reach some consensus
Why can't we just live happily together
Why can't we bless sky and earth as one
Why can't we love and pray as one?

(Spoken) Ah, my brother vertebrates...I knew you'd understand.

Stories of old and all the fairy tales
Tell us that hate can't solve a conflict
We fall in love to find the truth
That even birds have a right to live too.

We can dream another fantasy tomorrow
All we know will change and flowers grow high, minutes tick by
Oh life is so unreal but that's what makes it real
That's what makes one day so hard to feel

When girls get their way, they will give in return
Kindness and charm make one forgiving
We search for love to find the truth
That we only find when we give up searching

We can dream another fantasy tomorrow
All we know will change and flowers grow high, minutes tick by
Oh life is so unreal but that's what makes it real
That's what makes one day so hard to feel
Oh life is so unreal but that's what makes it real
That's what makes one life so real


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