Tori Amos is in a truck on the corner on 56th and Madison, on a cell phone that isn't hers.

"New York is quite a buzz," she says in the honey-smooth drawl of a native North American who has migrated to England. "I like a good buzz. Especially when I'm lucid."

Amos just wrapped up a question and answer session with New York City media. The session ran late, but only because Amos refused to conclude without talking to every single reporter.

"You've got these sweethearts standing in line, and when they started to get turned away, you just go, 'Oh dear,' " Amos laments.

Amos is patiently and attentively coping with media to support her recently released album, Scarlet's Walk, and her nation-crossing tour, which kicked off Nov. 7 in Tampa, Fla., and hits up the Philadelphia area Friday.

On music:

Amos' seventh album, Scarlet's Walk, leads listeners on a journey across America with her thinly veiled alter ego Scarlet and her quest for self-realization.

During the course of 3,000 miles, crimson-haired chanteuse Amos encounters a country searching for an identity after the Sept. 11 tragedies.

"It is a narrative," Amos said in a light, metered lilt. "There's a character, plot, story and a back story, [but] I didn't approach it like that. I didn't sit down and decide to write a road trip novel. Songs usually come to me in segments."

Amos comes from a long tradition of songwriters and storytellers, penning cryptically poetic lyrics and hauntingly evocative piano tunes. Her lyrics have expounded upon rape, gender inequality, marriage, miscarriage and motherhood.

"The tradition of being a songwriter takes a lot of devotion and commitment," Amos said. "Storytelling has been going on a long, long, long time. People want to come to the metaphorical campfire."

Amos' notoriously devoted fans join hands around her piano, her voice, her stage -- her campfire.

"The show is an exchange," Amos said. "It's a ceremony. We take it very seriously. Seriously, but with a giggle."

On America:

Scarlet's Walk examines the changing relationship between America and her people in Sept. 11's aftermath. Amos is one of those changed by Sept. 11, as she was in New York City on the day America fell to her knees.

"We walked Fifth Avenue and smelled her burning," Amos said. "America has a soul and was alive and was in pain. Many of us were called that day to rethink our relationship and responsibility to her, and [whether] she [is] in safe hands."

Amos grew up in Maryland as the daughter of a Methodist minister, but she currently resides in England with her sound engineer husband Mark Hawley and their 2-year-old daughter, Natashya. Yet Amos remains American in heart, soul and insight.

"There's a real kind of generic American you get in Europe," Amos said. "You get this perception that we are mouthpiece of the government. But there is a culture quite separate from government."

She said the media portrays America as unified, even though it is a nation of differing visions.

"The torch is lit, there is questioning," Amos emphasized.

In addition to serving as a songwriter, Amos is a political activist and co-founder of the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (RAINN), the nation's largest anti-sexual assault organization. Amos said activism is essential in questioning whether our true mother, our land, is in the right hands.

"You're more powerful than you know," Amos said. "You could start movements if you wanted to. Those who are in power do not see you as a threat because you have marginalized yourselves."

"Your generation has an opportunity to rise," Amos continued, with the gauzy sagacity of a wizened woman. "The medicine men and women have spoken about it. You are the dragon generation. You can make change."

On womanhood:

Amos' first three albums, from 1992's Little Earthquakes to 1996's Boys for Pele, portray a girl blossoming into poised womanhood.

"[It's about] a single woman involved in relationships, but not as a woman who has lost a child yet," said Amos, who suffered a series of miscarriages before birthing Natashya, who she tenderly calls Tash.

Amos finds that raising Tash has altered her perspectives and musical ambitions.

"You can't put yourself in the center," Amos admitted. "You've got to put your child in the center, and until I was a mom, I didn't do that."

Motherhood has helped Amos rediscover and reconnect to children's stories, especially Tash's favorite, Alice in Wonderland, and Amos' heroine, Mary Poppins.

"They've been able to stay potent for 100 years, 200 years," Amos marveled. "As a writer, that's motivation. It's about writing music that penetrates, that seeps through the heart, that sits there and grows and grows and grows."

Amos accentuated that she has grown since breaking onto the music scene a decade ago, and hopes that those who listen to her albums can empathize with and find strength in her evolution.

"There were some troubled waters," Amos said, explaining her progression into musical and emotional maturity. "Sometimes it feels like you have to fight for yourself at the table. Truly there's room enough, if you're at the right table."

But Amos recognizes that finding the right table can be arduous and agonizing, especially for girls.

"From girlhood to womanhood, there are going to be dark days," Amos said with the gentle cadence of so many mothers before her. "Welcome them. Open the door. Give them a plate of spaghetti."

"If you're waiting for other people to recognize you, then you're going to have a very painful wait," Amos continued. "Sometimes you've got to see that you don't need anyone to approve of how you arrived at the door."