A ray
Split by
The fragments
Of a
Broken
Mirror
A window
Lit
Against the
Night
These are my
Hopes
In times
Of
Terror
These
My
Moments of
Respite
(Delight).
Held tight in jaws of
Fear & Force
A country
Dies - for Power
Has learned:
The more it takes,
The more the mass
Moves back to
Give it space
Fear
Snowballs into
Madness
Here, where violence
Parades
As
Law
Le temps qui passe
Le temps qui ne passe pas
Le temps qu'on tue
Le temps de compter jusqu'a dix
Le temps qu'on n'a pas
Le temps qu'il fait
Le temps de s' ennuyer
Le temps de rever
Le temps de l'agonie
Le temps qu'on perd
Le temps d'aimer
Le temps des cerises
Le mauvais temps
Et le bon et le beau
Et le froid et le temps chaud
Le temps de se retourner
Le temps des adieux
Le temps qu'il est bien temps
Le temps qui n'est meme pas
Le temps de cligner de l'oeil
Le temps relatif
Le temps de boire un coup
Le temps d'attendre
Le temps du bon bout
Le temps de mourir
Le temps qui ne se mesure pas
Le temps de crier gare
Le temps mort
Et puis l'eternite
Adieu lezards adieu corbeaux
Bonsoir les hommes et vous les veaux
Tout est a recommencer
Quand vous gueulez
Comme des damnes
Je sais bien que tout s'effondre
Chaque jour et chaque nuit
Que je n'ai plus rien a attendre
Et que tout ce qui s'ensuit
C'est de savoir que je suis dupe
Les soirs tombent comme les annees
Je ne sais meme plus les compter
Ce n'est plus jamais a prendre
Mais pour toujours tout laisser
Rien ne peut recommencer
Adieu vantard adieu salaud
Bonsoir cretin et toi le veau
C'est moi qui ai commence
Quand je gueulais
Comme un damne
Ils sont la cent cinquante
Ils ne dorment pas
Ils attendent
Il y a ceux qui attendent toujours
Il y ceux qui murmurent un nom
Ceux qui respirent a peine
Ceux qui mentent
Il y a ceux qui suffrent sans cesse
Ceux qui crient doucement
Ceux qui chantent
Il y ceux qui ont faim et soif
Ceux qui marchent lentement
Ceux qui mangent
Il y a ceux qui hurlent de toutes leurs forces
Ceux qui baissent la tete
Ceux qui vivent
Hommes de peines
Hommes de peine
Que nos nuits sont longues
Well I used to think this talk of spaceships
Was just so much hype
I really believed there was nothing out there
Except the Stras and the Stripes
I mean the scientists said they found out that
There was nothing there on Mars
So as far as I was concerned it was just
The name of a candy bar
I'm one of those kind of people
Who need proof before they believe
Close Encounters left me cold
And Star Trek seemed naive
When it came to U.F.O.'s
I was of the scientific school
Little green men with pointed heads
Were for little kids and fools
But I was wrong
I was wrong
I was real wrong
I was wrong
All along
I was so wrong
The people who believed that stuff
Were always kind of odd
I mean you might as well go all the way
And believe in Jesus and God
I knew I had the kind of mind
That wasn't easily satisfied
And besides I had enough trouble on earth
To keep me occupied
And then one night I was standing outside
Looking at the stars
And I heard something that sounded like
A hundred space guitars
The music was so weird it could have
Been the theme from Jaws
Then I saw something flying over my head
I thoughtit was Santa Claus
But I was wrong
I was wrong
I was real wrong
I was wrong
All along
I was so wrong
Here's another song about a place near Hong Kong
They got lots of opium and Lapsang Souchong
Siam, Siam
All the fancy pussycats come from this area
Also got a lot of animals that scare ya
Siam, Siam
Python legs are poached in slimy toad saliva
After eating that I'm lucky I'm aliva
I am, yes I am
Ask the King if you can stay to sample cuisine
Maybe he will even let dine with the Queen
Siam, Siam
Nicest little place I live in since Budapest
If you think that I'm in love you're right, I confess
I am, I am, yes I am, with Siam
I am...
Do you long to cavolt?
Here's a new water sport
That you ought to try
It's a Fahrenheit dream
Hot and covered with steam
You won't be bored
Do you want to get wet?
Are you starting to sweat?
Slip over the side
Now we're caught in a swell
Here's when Heaven and Hell
Star to collide
It's slippery and slimy
reach over here and tie me
I'm so warm that I can hardly move
Mother never told me
I'd need someone to hold me
But where I'm from the rivers all are cold
It's a fisherman's dream
Dinners already steamed
And ready to eat
When you feel your resolve
Is about to dissolve
Then stop for a treat
In a river of steam
Nothing seems too obscene
So let down your hair
While you drift through a trough
Slip your bathing suit off
And really get clean
You can do your laundry
While your thoughts are wandering
And you watch the passing swimmers poach
You don't need no Sterno
In Dante's Inferno
It's Thermohydriatically controlled
You can't stay in too long
'Cause the heat is too strong
You're starting to slide
Grab ahold of the rope
Throw your soap in the boat
Climb over the side
We can come back for more
When we start to get bored
There's nothing as wild
As a Hot River swim
On the volcanic rim
Just when we was startin' to play
Someone yelled out take 'em away
Then we heard 'em startin' to boo
What did you do? what did you do?
I reacted intelligently
Here's my method, try it and see
When somebody's runnin' you down
You got to turn it around, turn it around
So when they boo at me you know what I do?
I tell 'em boo to you too, boo to you too
Boo to you too, boo to you too
I don't take it personally
When somebody's booin' at me
Makes no difference if the music is fine
I never pay it no mind, pay it no mind
When you're tryin' something that's new
You'll have people booin' at you
When we hear 'em startin' to boo
What do we do? What do we do?
Well when they boo at us you know what we do?
We tell 'em boo to you too, boo to you too
Boo to you too, boo to you too
Keep your chin up, play what you feel
Music's always good if it's real
Even if they're cruel to you
You got to do what you do, do what you do
When they're ready to tear you apart
Use your noodle and try to be smart
Don't just stand there takin' abuse
You got to put it to use, put it to use
You make 'em boo on cue, they say boo
And you say boo to you too
Boo to you too, boo to you too
I try
God knows I try
It seems very clear to me, That I do
You don't know what I mean, do ya?
You don't know what I mean
I mean
I mean I try
God knows that I mean to try
I mean it seems so very clear to me, that I'm trying
But it's not clear to you , what I'm trying to do
You don't know what I mean, do ya?
You don't know what I mean
You're not trying
God knows you probably mean to try
I mean sometimes it even seems clear to me that you're trying to try
Is that clear? Do you know what I mean,what I'm trying to say
You don't know what I mean, do ya?
You don't know what I mean
God knows I try
Wevin', we're wervin'
Do you need a doctor?
Swervin' and curvin'
Are you pocket trained?
Do you like to werve?
Do you have the nerve?
Do you need a doctor
When you start to swerve?
Are you pocket trained
Goin' round a curve?
Can you werve?
Wervin', we're wervin'
Do you save the coupons?
Swervin' and curvin'
Can I burrow your suit?
Can you werve like a bird
Or do you find it obsurd?
Did you come prepurd
Can I burrow your suit?
Do you find it un nervin'
Or pleasantly disturbin'
Can you werve?
Wervin', we're wervin'
Do you have your 'chute?
Swervin' and curvin'
Does your mother know?
Do you worry when you werve?
Are you scared when you swerve?
Do you get what you deserve
When you around a curve?
I can see your house
Have you lost your nerve?
Can you werve?
Werve
Werve
Werve
Here's a shocking revelation for you voyeurs
Such a heinous deviation, there are no cures
I'm a Mineralist, I'm a Mineralist
Just the thought of ironing gives me spasms of lust
I creep up to old wrecked cars and lick off the rust
I'm a Mineralist, I'm a Mineralist
Mother used to try to metal in my affairs
Keep your nose up off that grindstone, people will stare
Get the lead out of your pants and change your underwear
I've been stealing baby bottles since I was born
I'll go blind from balling bearings, doctors have warned
I like making out with steel-rimmed glasses more than horned
Erik Satie gets my rocks off, Cage is a dream
Philip Glass is Mineralist to the extreme
I like tickling ivories and fingering stones
When my Mercury goes up I play with my bone
People take for granite my perversion is wrong
I'm not harming anyone by beating my gong
I'm a Mineralist, I'm a Mineralist
I'll make love to minerals as long as I can
And in fifty years I'll be a jaded old man
I'm a Mineralist, I'm a Mineralist
I'm a Mineralist, I'm a Mineralist
This life is bare
& cold
& I am old
& tired of truth
Must we forever
Make our History
In this Cold
Country?
Who will accuse us
If we choose
To dream -
To take a World
Already made -
To sit before
A fire that warms
& not to ask
Who built it, or
What burns?
The hearts of stone were here
Where waters wash
The ones who spoke &
Would not hear, the ones
Who built the walls;
These miles were theirs,
These ranks of Air...
Now only blooms recall
The glory & the pity of
Their fall.
I fell in the moss
I grasped the grass
I bit the earth
I pressed myself against
The Earth.
I held it tightly.
Nothing stirred
I waited.
The air moved, slightly,
The grass moved
The leaves moved in the trees
A thousand insects moved -
I moved &
The World moved,
Lightly.
I was not
Deceived.
I waited, at the gate
I waited, for a Word,
I waited, to be judged
- or to be heard -
I only aged,
Unloved - I found
Despair -
Who all my days
Stood at the gate &
Waited others
There.
In a late evening
Dark, But no so dark,
Out to the river, we walked
A strange river, to us
In strange fields, in a valley -
As strangers we strolled to the
Water, as sleeping falks do, in
Strange countries, who stroll
In an evening.
- & over the river, a mountain,
Alone, in the half dark,
A mass of dense darkness,
Of Blackness, & by it
A star - One Bright Star -
To the right of the mountain
& near to its top, very close
To it, one star alone - that
In light all the mass of the mountain
Held balanced; a memory
Shook us, that none of us had, but
All shared, & at once started
Talking, who all knew this picture;
This star & thus mountain, these
Masses & forces, these shapes &
Positions, this darkness & light -
In its infinite sum -
All we knew & remembered, who
Woke for a moment.....
...in the midst of a journey
We never begin.
Given free will but within certain limitations
I cannot will myself to limitless mutations
I cannot know what would be if I were not me
I can only guess me
'Cause when I say that I know me how can I know that?
What does a spider know of arachnids versus insects?
I know my senses and my sense of having senses
Do I guide them or they me?
The weight of dust exceeds the weight of settled objects
What can it mean, such gravity without a centre?
Is there freedom to un-be, is there freedom
From will to be?
Sheer momentum makes us act this way or that way
We just invent or just assume a motivation
I would disperse, be disconnected - is this possible?
What are forces without force?
Be in the air but not be air, be in the no-air
Be on the loose, neither compacted nor suspended
Neither born nor left to die
Had I been free I could have chosen not to be me
Demented drivers push me madly 'round a treadmill
Let me off please
I am so very tired...
(lyrics adapted from 'The Song Of The Lower Classes' by Ernest Jones)
We're low - we're low - mere rabble, we know
But, at our plastic power,
The mould at the lording's feet will grow
Into palace and church and tower
Then prostrate fall - in the rich man's hall,
And cringe at the rich man's door;
We're not too low to build the wall,
But too low to tread the floor.
Down, down we go - we're so very low,
To the hell of the deep sunk mines,
But we gather the proudest gems that glow,
When the crown of a despot shines.
And whenever he lacks - upon our backs
Fresh loads he designs to lay;
We're far too low to vote the tax,
But not too low to pay.
We're low - we're low - we're very very low,
Yet from our fingers glide
The silken flow - and the robes that glow
Round the limbs of the sons of pride.
And what we get - and what we give -
We know, and we know our share;
We're not too low the cloth to weave,
But too low the cloth to wear!
(Lyrics adapted from a parody of a popular patriotic Victorian song)
Happy land! happy land! Thy fame resounds shore to shore
Happy land! where 'tis a crime, they tell us, to be poor.
If you shelter cannot find, of you they'll soon take care:
Most likely send you to grind wind - For sleeping in the air.
Happy land! happy land! To praise thee, who will cease?
To guard us, pray, now ain't we got a precious New Police?
A passport we shall soon require, which by them must be scanned,
If we to take a walk desire - Oh, ain't this happy land?
Happy land! happy land! Ne'er from thee I will stray,
The soldier cries, because, y'see, he cannot get away.
For nothing flogged, with grief he sighs, while probably the band,
Strike up to drown the wretch's cries - To the tune of 'Happy Land!'
Happy land! happy land! is now the chant in every street.
Happy land! happy land! Sings everyone you meet.
The ballad-singer, minus clothes; shirtless, coatless,
And with buckets none to shield his toes - He warbles 'Happy land!'
Town in the shadow of a mountain
Crown of the mountain came avalanching down
All summer long
We were stalking what
We came to call THE SONG.
THE SONG was a kind of eruption -
Mover of mountains,
Avalanche of crowns
When we were young
We sought the laws
We thought would cause
THE SONG.
Life is a dream we are phantoms.
Man is the union of Divinity and Dust.
All summer long,
When we were young
Before we'd sung THE SONG.
No mere machine
Made of music
Of words and music
As other songs are -
This was THE SONG,
A recipe, a remedy a cure.
THE SONG would be sung
On the border
Sung by us standing
Straddling the line
Between two worlds
Unified only by THE SONG.
(Who?)
We who knew no woe
We who were her hero
(When?),
When we were on her knee
When we knew her
When we were one
(Where?)
Kew. Rhone.
We won renown
(How?)
We were her worker
We won honor enow
When we knew her
When we were one
Where?
Kew. Rhone.
Not a set animal,
Not a set animal, laminates
Laminates a tone of
A set animal,
Animal, laminates
Laminates a tone of sleep
A tone of sleep
Peel's foe, Not a set animal, laminates a tone of sleep.
It but incurs
A lustre in a flood -
After many not dislodged.
And at each subsidence
Half arises,
Half holds to cloudy water -
Nature of its anchor kept occult.
We keep a current
Flowing from a sluice.
Cloud it with corrosives -
Hoping to appropriate
What holds its own so well -
What tips an ever wider wake.
