What good is sitting alone in your [bad word] hear the music play
Life is a cabaret, old [bad word] to the cabaret

Put down the knitting, the book and the broom
It's time for a holiday
Life is a cabaret, old chum [bad word] to the cabaret [bad word] taste the [bad word] hear the [bad word] blow that horn
Start celebrating right this way
Your table's waiting

What could permitting some prophet of doom
To wipe every smile away
Life is a cabaret, old chum [bad word] to the cabaret

I used to have this girlfriend known as Elsie
With whom I shared four sordid rooms in Chelsea
She wasn't what you'd call a blushing flower
As a matter of fact she rented by the hour

The day she died the neighbors came to snicker
"Well, that's [bad word] from too much pills and liquor"
But when I saw her laid out like a Queen
She was the happiest corpse, I'd ever seen

I think of Elsie to this very day
I remember how she'd turn to me and say
"What good is sitting all alone in your [bad word] hear the music play
Life is a cabaret, old [bad word] to the cabaret

And as for me
And as for me
I made my mind up, back in Chelsea
When I go, I'm going like Elsie

Start by admitting from cradle to tomb
Isn't that long a stay
Life is a cabaret, old chum
It's only a cabaret, old chum
And I love a cabaret