Paint my face in your magazines
Make it look whiter than it seems
Paint me over with your dreams
Shove away my ethnicity
Burn every notion that I
May have a flame inside to fight
And say just what is on my mind
Without offending your might

'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?

So say what you want
Say what you want

I saw her face outside today
Weatherworn, lookin' all the rage
Took her passion and her gaze
And made a poster
Now it's moccasins we sport
We take the culture and contort
Perhaps only to distort
What we are hidin'

'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?

But say what you want
Say what you want
Say, say

Hey you, the one, the one outside
Are you gonna get in, get in?
Hey you, the one that don't fit in
How you, how you gonna get in?
Hey you, the one outside
Are you ever gonna get in with your
Broken teeth, broken jaw, broken mojo?

Yeah, this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?

'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?
'Cause this life is too short
To live it just for you
But when you feel so powerless
What are you gonna do?

Say what you want (life is too short)
Say what you want
Say what you want (just for you)
Say what you want
Say what you want (feel powerless)
Say what you want
Say, say, say, say, yeah (gonna do)

(Life is too short)
(Just for you)
(Feel powerless)
(Gonna do)

Copyright: BMG Rights Management, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd., Peermusic Publishing, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Writer(s): Anne Dudley, Brian West, Gerald Eaton, Malcolm Robert Andrew McLaren, Nelly Furtado, Trevor Charles Horn