Click HERE to go to the first Part of Lou Reed Lyrics

New York

Romeo Had Juliette

Caught between the twisted stars the plotted lines the faulty map
that brought Columbus to New York
Betwixt between the East and West he calls on her wearing a leather vest
the earth squeals and shudders to a halt
A diamond crucifix in his ear is used to help ward off the Fear
that he has left his soul in someone's rented car
Inside his pants he hides a mop to clean the mess that he has dropped
into the life of lithesome Juliette Bell

And Romeo wanted Juliette and Juliette wanted Romeo
And Romeo wanted Juliette and Juliette wanted Romeo

Romeo Rodriguez squares his shoulders and curses Jesus
runs a comb through his black pony-tail
He's thinking of his lonely room
the sink that by his bed gives off a stink
Then smells her perfume in his eyes and her voice was like a bell

Outside the street were steaming the crack dealers were dreaming
of an Uzi someone had just scored
I betcha I could hit that light with my one good arm behind my back
says little Joey Diaz
Brother give me another tote those downtown hoods are no damn good
those Italians need a lesson to be taught
This cop who died in Harlem you think they'd get the warnin'
I was dancing when his brains run out on the street

And Romeo had Juliette and Juliette had her Romeo
And Romeo had Juliette and Juliette had her Romeo

I'll take Manhattan in a garbage bag with Latin written on it that says
"It's hard to give a shit these days"
Manhattan's sinking like a rock, into the filthy Hudson what a shock
they wrote a book about it, they said it was like ancient Rome
The perfume burned his eyes, holding tightly to her thighs
and something flickered for a minute and then it vanished and was gone

Halloween Parade

There's a down town fairy singing out "Proud Mary"
as she cruises Christopher Street
And some Southern Queen is acting loud and mean
where the docks and the Badlands meet

This Halloween is something to be sure
Especially to be here without you

There's a Greta Garbo and an Alfred Hitchcock
and some black Jamaican stud
There's five Cinderellas and some leather drags
I almost fell into my mug

There's a Crawford, Davis and a tacky Cary Grant
And some Homeboys lookin' for trouble down here from the Bronx

But there ain't no Hairy and no Virgin Mary
you won't hear those voices again
And Johnny Rio and Rotten Rita
you'll never see those faces again

This Halloween is something to be sure
Especially to be here without you

There's the Born Again Losers and the Lavender Boozers
and some crack team from Washington Heights
The boys from Avenue B and the girls from Avenue D
a Tinkerbell in tights

This celebration somehow get me down
Especially when I see you're not around

There's no Peter Pedantic saying things romantic
In Latin, Greek or Spic
There's no Three bananas or Brandy Alexander
Dishing all their tricks

It's a different feeling that I have today
Especially when I know you've gone away

There's a girl from Soho with a teeshirt saying "I Blow"
She's with the "jive five 2 plus 3"
And the girls for pay dates are giving cut rates
Or else doing it for free

The past keeps knock knock knocking on my door
And I don't want to hear it anymore

No consolations please for feelin' funky
I got to get my head above my knees
But it makes me mad and mad makes me sad
And then I start to freeze

In the back of my mind I was afraid it might be true
In the back of my mind I was afraid that they meant you

The Halloween Parade
At the Halloween parade
At the Halloween parade
See you next year - at the Halloween parade

Dirty Blvd.

Pedro lives out of the Wilshire Hotel
He looks out a window without glass
The walls are made of cardboard, newspapers on his feet
His father beats him 'cause he's too tired to beg

He's got 9 brothers and sisters, they're brought up on their knees
It's hard to run when a coat hanger beats you on the things
Pedro dreams of being older and killing the old man
but that's a slim chance he's going to the boulevard

He's going to end up, on the dirty boulevard
He's going out, to the dirty boulevard
He's going down, to the dirty boulevard

This room cost 2,000 dollars a month, you can believe it man it's true
Somewhere a landlord's laughing till he wets his pants
No one here dreams of being a doctor or a lawyer or anything
they dream of dealing on the dirty boulevard

Give me your hungry, your tired your poor I'll piss on 'em
That's what the Statue of Bigotry says
Your poor huddled masses, let's club 'em to death
and get it over with and just dump 'em on the boulevard

Get 'em out, on the dirty boulevard.
Going out, to the dirty boulevard.
They're going down, on the dirty boulevard.

Going out

Outside it's a bright night, there's an opera at Lincoln Center
Movie stars arrive by limousine
The klieg lights shoot up over the skyline of Manhattan
But the lights are out on the mean streets

A small kid stands by the Lincoln Tunnel
He's selling plastic roses for a buck
The traffic's backed up to 39th street
The TV Whores are calling the Cops out for a Suck

And back at the Wilshire, Pedro sits there dreaming
He's found a book on Magic in a garbage can
He looks at the pictures and stares at the cracked ceiling
"At the count of 3" he says, "I hope I can disappear"

And fly fly away, from this dirty boulevard
I want to fly, from dirty boulevard
I want to fly, from dirty boulevard
I want to fly, fly, fly, fly, from dirty boulevard

I want to fly away
I want to fly
Fly, fly away
I want to fly
Fly, fly away
Fly, fly, fly
Fly, fly away
Fly away

*** Thanx to Ugo who corrected a few mistakes ***

Endless Cycle

The bias of the father runs on through the son
and leaves him bothered and bewildered
The drugs in his veins only cause him to spit
at the face staring back in the mirror
How can he tell a good act from the bad
he can't even remember his name
How can he do what needs to be done
when he's a follower not a leader

The sickness of the mother runs on through the girl
leaving her small and helpless
Liquor files through her brain with the force of a gun
leaving her running in circles
How can she tell a good act from the bad
when she's flat on her back in her room
How can she do what needs to be done
when she's a coward and a bleeder

The man if he marries will batter his child
and have endless excuses
The woman sadly will do much the same
thinking that it's right and it's proper
Better than their mommy or their daddy did
Better than the childhood they suffered
The truth is they're happier when they're in pain
In fact, that's why they got married

There Is No Time

This is no time for Celebration
This is no time for Shaking Heads
This is no time for Backslapping
This is no time for Marching Bands

This is no time for Optimism
This is no time for Endless Thought
This is no time for my country Right or Wrong
Remember what that brought

There is no time X4

This is no time for Congratulations
This is no time to Turn Your Back
This is no time for Circumlocution
This is no time for Learned Speech

This is no time to Count Your Blessings
This is no time for Private Gain
This is no time to Put Up or Shut Up
It won't no time to come back this way again

There is no time X4

This is no time to Swallow Anger
This is no time to Ignore Hate
This is no time to be Acting Frivolous
because the time is getting late

This is no time for Private Vendettas
This is no time to not know who you are
Self knowledge is a dangerous thing
The freedom of who you are

This is no time to Ignore Warnings
This is no time to Clear the Plate
Let's not be sorry after the fact
and let the past become out fate

There is no time X4

This is no time to turn away and drink
or smoke some vials of crack
This is a time to gather force
and take dead aim and Attack

This is no time for Celebration
This is no time for Saluting Flags
This is no time for Inner Searchings
The future is at head

This is no time for Phony Rhetoric
This is no time for Political Speech
This is a time for Action
because the future's Within Reach

This is the time X3
because there is no time

There is no time X4

Last Great American Whale

They say he didn't have an enemy
His was a greatness to behold
He was the last surviving progeny
The last one on this side of the world

He measured half a mile from tip to tail
silver and black with powerful fins
They say he could split a mountain in two
That's how we got the Grand Canyon

Last Great American Whale X4

Some say they saw him at the Great Lakes
Some say they saw him off the coast of Florida
My mother said she saw him in Chinatown
but you can't always trust your mother

Off the Carolinas the sun shines brightly in the day
The lighthouse glow ghostly there at night
The chief of a local tribe had killed a racist mayor's son
and he'd been on death row since 1958

The mayor's kid was a rowdy pig
spit on Indians and lots worse
The old chief buried a hatchet in his head
life compared to death for him seemed worse

The tribal brothers gathered in the lighthouse to sing
and tried to conjure up a storm or rain
The harbor parted and the great whale sprang full up
and caused a hugh tidal wave

The wave crushed the jail and freed the chief
The tribe let out a roar
The whites were drowned
the browns and reds set free
but sadly one thing more

Some local yokel member of the NRA
kept a bazooka in his living room
and thinking he had the chief in his sight
blew the whale's brains out with a lead harpoon

Last Great American Whale X4

Well Americans don't care for much of anything
land and water the least
And animal life is low on the totem pole
with human life not worth more than infected yeast

Americans don't care too much for beauty
They'll shit in a river, dump battery acid in a stream
They'll watch dead rats wash up on the beach
and complain if they can't swim

They say things are done for the majority
Don't believe half of what you see, and none of what you hear
It's a lot like what my painter friend Donald said to me
"Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over, they're done"

Beginning Of A Great Adventure

It might be great to have a kid that I could kick around
a little me to fill up with my thought
A little me or he or she to fill up with my dreams
a way of saying life is not a loss

I'd keep the tyke away from school and tutor him myself
keep him from the poison of crowd
But then again pristine isolation might not be the best idea
It's not good trying to immortalize yourself

Beginning Of A Great Adventure
Beginning Of A Great Adventure

Why stop at one, I might have ten, a regular TV brood
I'd breed a little liberal army in the wood
Just like these redneck lunatics I see at the local bar
with their tribe of mutant inbred piglets with cloven hoovers

I'd teach them how to plant a bomb, start a fire, play guitar
and if they catch a hunter, shoot him in the nuts
I'd try to be as progressive as I could possibly be
as long as I didn't have to try too much

Beginning Of A Great Adventure
Beginning Of A Great Adventure

Susie, Jesus, Bogart, Sam Leslie, Jill and Jeff
Rita, Winny, Andy, Fran and Jet
Boris, Bono, Lucy, Ethel Bunny, Reg and Tom
that's a lot of named to try not to forget

Carrie, Marlon, No and Steve La Rue and Jerry Lee
Eggplant, Rufus, Dummy, Star and The Glob
I'd need a damn computer to keep track of all these names
I hope this baby thing don't go too far

I hope it's true what my wife said to me
I hope it's true what my wife said to me
Hey I hope it's true what my wife said to me

She says, baby, it's the Beginning of a Great Adventure
Baby, it's the Beginning of a Great Adventure
Take a look

It might be fun to have a kid that I could kick around
create in my own image like a god
I'd raise my own pallbearers to carry me to my grave
and keep me company when I'm a wizened toothless clod

Some gibbering old fool sitting all alone drooling on his shirt
some senile old fart playing in the dirt
It might be fun to have a kid I could pass something on to
something better than rage, pain, anger and hurt

I hope it's true what my wife said to me
I hope it's true what my wife said to me
I hope it's true what my wife said to me
She says Lou, it's the Beginning of a Great Adventure
Lou, Lou, Lou, Beginning of a Great Adventure
She says baby, how you call your lover boy
Sylvia, quite you call your lover man

Busload Of Faith

You can't depend on your family
You can't depend on your friends
You can't depend on a beginning
You can't depend on an end

You can't depend on intelligence
Ooohhh, you can't depend on a god
You can only depend on one thing
You need a Busload of Faith to get by, watch, baby

Busload of Faith to get by X3
You need a Busload of Faith to get by

You can depend on the worst always happening
You can depend on a murderer's drive
You can bet that if he rapes somebody
There'll be no problem having a child

And you can bet that if she aborts it
Pro-Lifers will attack her with rage
You can depend on the worst always happening
You need a Busload of Faith to get by, yeah

Busload of Faith to get by X2
Busload of Faith to get by, babe
Busload of Faith to get by

You can't depend on the goodly hearted
The goodly hearted made lampshades and soap
You can't depend on the Sacrament
No Father, no Holy Ghost

You can't depend on any churches
Unless there's a real estate you want to buy
You can't depend on a lot of things
You need a Busload of Faith to get by, wow

Busload of Faith to get by X4

You can't depend on no miracle
You can't depend on the air
You can't depend on a wise man
You can't find them because they're not there

You can depend on cruelty
Crudity of thought and sound
You can depend on the worst always happening
You need a Busload of Faith to get by, ha

Busload of Faith to get by X4

Sick Of You

I was up in the morning with the TV blarin'
brush my teeth sittin' watchin' the news
All the beaches were closed the ocean was a Red Sea
but there was no one there to part in two
There was no fresh salad because there's hypos in the cabbage
Staten Island disappeared at noon
And they say the midwest is in great distress
and NASA blew up the moon

The ozone layer has no ozone anymore
and you're gonna leave me for the guy next door
I'm Sick of You, I'm Sick of You

They arrested the Mayor for an illegal favor
sold the Empire State to Japan
And Oliver North married William Secord
and gave birth to a little Teheran
And the Ayatollah bought a nuclear warship
if he dies he wants to go out in style
And there's nothing to eat that don't carry the stink
of some human waste dumped in the Nile

We one thing is certainly true
no one here knows what to do
I'm Sick of You, I'm Sick of You

The radio said there were 400 dead
in some small town in Arkansas
Some whacked out trucker drove into a nuclear reactor
and killed everybody he saw
Now he's on Morton Downey and he's glowing and shining
doctors say this is a medical advance
They say the bad makes the good and there's something to be learned
in every human experience

Well I know one thing that really is true
This here's a zoo and the keeper ain't you
And I'm sick of it, I'm Sick of You

They ordained the Trumps and then he got the mumps
and died being treated at Mt. Sinal
And my best friend Bill died from a poison pill
some wired doctor prescribed for stress
My arms and legs are shrunk the food all has lumps
They discovered some animal no one's ever seen
It was an inside trader eating a rubber tire
after running over Rudy Giuliani

They say the President's dead but no one can find his head
It's been missing now for weeks
But no one noticed it he had seemed so fit
and I'm Sick of it

I'm Sick of You, I'm so Sick of You, bye, bye, bye
bye, bye, bye

Hold On

There's blacks with knives and whites with guns
fighting in Howard Beach
There's no such thing as human rights
when you walk the N.Y.streets
A cop was shot in the head by a 10 years old kid
named Buddah in Central Park last week
The fathers and daughters are lined up by the coffins
by the Statue of Bigotry

You better hold on, something's happening here
You better hold on, meet you in Tompkins Square

The dopers sent a message to the cops last weekend
they shot him in the car where he sat
And Eleanor Bumpers and Michael Stewart
must have appreciated that
There's a rampaging rage rising up like a plague
of bloody vials washing up on the beach
It'll take more than the Angels or Iron Mike Tyson
to heal this bloody breach, hey, hey

You better hold on, something's happening here
You better hold on, meet you in Tompkins Square

A junkie ran down a lady a pregnant dancer
she'll never dance but the baby was saved
He shot up some China White and nodded out at the wheel
and he doesn't remember a thing
They shot that old lady 'cause they thought she was a witness to
a crime she didn't even see
Whose home is the home of the brave
by the Statue of Bigotry, hey

You better hold on, something's happening here
You better hold on, meet you in Tompkins Square

You got a black .38 and a gravity knife
you still have to ride the train
There's the smelly essence of N.Y. down there
but you ain't no Bernard Goetz
There's no Mafia lawyer to fight in your corner for that
15 minutes of fame
The have and the have nots are bleeding in the tub
that's New York's future not mine, oh

You better hold on, something's happening here
You better hold on, something's happening here
Hold on

Good Evening Mr.Waldheim

Good evening Mr.Waldheim
and Pontiff how are you ?
You have so much in common
in the things you do
And here comes Jesse Jackson
he talks of Common Ground
Does that Common Ground include me
or is it just a sound

A sound that shakes
Oh Jesse, you must watch the sounds you make
A sound that quakes
There are fears that still reverberate

Jesse you say Common Ground
does that include the PLO ?
What about people right here right now
who fought for you not so long ago ?
The words that flow so freely
falling dancing from your lips
I hope that you don't cheapen them
with a racist slip

Oh Common Ground
Is Common Ground a word or just a sound
Common Ground
Remember those civil rights workers buried in the ground

If I ran for President
and once was a member of the Klan
wouldn't you call me on it
the way I call you on Farrakhan
And Pontiff, pretty Pontiff
can anyone shake your hand ?
Or is it just that you like uniforms
and someone kissing your hand

Or is it true
The Common Ground for me includes you too
Oh is it true
The Common Ground for me includes you too

Good evening Mr.Waldheim
pontiff how are you
As you both stroll through the woods at night
I'm thinking thoughts of you
And Jesse you're inside my thoughts
as the rhythmic words subside
My Common Ground invites you in
or do you prefer to wait outside

Or is it true
The Common Ground for me is without you
Or is it true
The Common Ground for me is without you
Oh is it true
There's no Ground Common enough for me and you

Xmas In February

Sam was lyin' in the jungle
agent orange spread against the sky like marmalade
Hendrix played on some foreign jukebox
they were praying to be saved
Those gooks were fierce and fearless
that's the price you pay when you invade
Xmas in February

Sam lost his arm in some border town
his fingers are mixed with someone's crop
If he didn't have that opium to smoke
the pain would never ever stop
Half his friends are stuffed into black body bags
with their names printed at the top
Xmas in February

Sammy was a short order cook
in a short order black and blue collar town
Everybody worked the steel mill
but the steel mill got closed down
He thought if he joined the Army
he'd have a future that was sound
Like no Xmas in February

Sam's staring at the Vietnam Wall
it's been a while now that he's home
His wife and kid have left, he's unemployed
He's a reminder of the war that wasn't won
He's the guy on the street with the sign that reads
"Please help send this Vet home"
But he is home
And there's no Xmas in February
No matter how much he saves

Strawman

We who have so much to you who have so little
to you who don't have anything at all
We who have so much more than any one man does need
and you who don't have anything at all, ah
Does anybody need another million dollar movie
does anybody need another million dollar star
Does anybody need to be told over and over
spitting in the wind comes back at you twice as hard

Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, going straight to hell
Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, Strawman
Strawman, Strawman, yes

Does anyone really need a billion dollar rocket
does anyone need a $60,000 car
Does anyone need another President
or the sins of Swaggart parts 6, 7, 8, and 9, ah
Does anyone need another politician
caught with his pants down money sticking in his hole
Does anyone need another racist preacher
spittin' in the wind can only do you harm, wow

Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, going straight to hell
Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, Strawman
Strawman, Strawman

Does anyone need another faulty shuttle
blasting off to the Moon, Venus or Mars
Does anyone need another self-righteous rock and roll singer
whose nose he says has led him straight to God
Does anyone need yet another blank skyscraper
If you're like me I'm sure a minor miracle will do
A flaming sword or maybe a gold ark floating up the Hudson
When you spit in the wind it comes right back at you

Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, going straight to hell
Strawman, going straight to the devil
Strawman, Strawman, Strawman
Strawman, Strawman

Dime Store Mystery

He was lying banged and battered, skewered and bleeding
talking crippled on the Cross
Was his mind reeling and heaving hallucinating
fleeing what a loss

The things he hadn't touched or kissed his senses
slowly stripped away
Not like Buddha not like Vishnu
life wouldn't rise through him again

I find it easy to believe
That he might question his beliefs
The beginning of the Last Temptation
Dime Story Mystery

The duality of nature, Godly nature,
human nature splits the soul
Fully human, fully divine and divided
the great immortal soul

Split into pieces, whirling pieces, opposites
attract
From the front, the side, the back
the mind itself attacks

I know the feeling, I know it from before
Descartes through Hegel belief is never sure
Dime Store Mystery, Last Temptation

I was sitting drumming thinking thumping pondering
the Mysteries of Life
Outside the city shrieking screaming whispering
the Mysteries of Life

There's a funeral tomorrow
at St. Patrick's the bells will ring for you
Ah, what must you have been thinking
when you realized the time had come for you

I wish I hadn't thrown away my time
on so much Human and so much less Divine
The end of the Last Temptation
The end of a Dime Store Mystery

Songs For Drella

Smalltown

When you're growing up in a small town
When you're growing up in a small town
When you're growing up in a small town
You say no one famous ever came from here

When you're growing up in a small town
and you're having a nervous breakdown
and you think that you'll never escape it
Yourself or the place that you live

Where did Picasso come from
There's no Michelangelo coming from Pittsburgh
If art is the tip of the iceberg
I'm the part sinking below

When you're growing up in a small town
Bad skin, bad eyes, gay and fatty
People look at you funny
When you're in a small town

My father worked in construction
It's not something for which I'm suited
Oh, what is something for which you are suited ?
Getting out of here

I hate being odd in a small town
If they stare let them stare in New York City
As this pink eyed painting albino
How far can my fantasy go ?

I'm no Dali coming from Pittsburgh
No adorable lisping Capote
My hero, oh, do you think I could meet him ?
I'd camp out at his front door

There is only one good thing about small town
There is only one good use for a small town
There is only one good thing about small town
You know that you want to get out

When you're growing up in a small town
You know you'll grow down in a small town
There is only one good use for a small town

You hate it and you'll know you have to leave

Open House

Please
Come over to 81st street I'm in the apartment
above the bar
You know you can't miss it, it's across from the subway
and the tacky store with the mylar scarves
My skin's as pale as outdoors moon
my hair's silver like a Tiffany watch
I like lots of people around me but don't kiss hello
and please don't touch

It's a Czechoslovakian custom my mother passed on to me
The way to make friends Andy is invite them up for tea
Open house, open house

I've got a lot of cats, here's my favorite
she's lady called Sam
I made a paper doll of her, you can have it
That's what I did when I had St.Vitus dance

It's a Czechoslovakian custom my mother passed on to me
Give people little presents so they remember me
Open house, open house

Someone bring the vegetables
someone please bring heat
My mother showed up yesterday
we need something to eat

I think I got a job today they want me to draw shoes
The ones I drew were old and used, they told me to draw something new
Open house, open house

Fly me to the moon
fly me to a star
But there are no stars in the New York sky
they're all on the ground

You scared yourself with music, I scared myself with paint
I drew 550 different shoes today, it almost made me faint
Open house, open house
Open house, open house

Style It Takes

You've got the money, I've got the time
You want your freedom, make your freedom mine
'Cause I've got the style it takes
And money is all that it takes

You've got connections, I've got the art
You like my attention and I like your looks
And I have the style it takes
And you know the people it takes

Why don't you sit right over there, we'll do a movie portrait
I'll turn the camera on and I won't even be there
A portrait that moves, you look great I think

I'll put the Empire State Building on your wall
For 24 hours glowing on your wall
Watch the sun rise above it in your room
Wallpaper art, a great view

I've got a Brillo box and I say it's art
It's the same one you can buy at any supermarket
'Cause I've got the style it takes
And you've got the people it takes

This is a rock group called The Velvet Underground
I show movies on them, do you like their sound
'Cause they have a style that grates
And I have art to make

Let's do a movie here next week
We don't have sound but you're so great
You don't have to speak

You've got the style it takes, Kiss
You've got the style it takes, Eat
You've got the style it takes, Couch
You've got the style it takes, Kiss

Work

Andy was a Catholic
the ethic ran through his bones
He lived alone with his mother
collecting gossip and toys

Every Sunday when he went to Church
He'd kneel in his pew and say
"It's work, all that matters is work."

He was a lot of things
what I remember most he'd say
"I've got to bring home the bacon
someone's got to bring home the roast."

He'd get to the factory early
If you'd ask him he'd tell you straight out
It's work

No matter what I did it never seemed enough
he said I was lazy, I said I was young
He said, "How many songs did you write ?"
I'd written zero, I'd lied and said, "Ten."

"You won't be young forever
You should have written fifteen"
It's work

"You ought to make things big
people like it that way
And the songs with the dirty words
make sure your record them that way"

Andy liked to stir up trouble
he was funny that way
He said, "It's just work

Andy sat down to talk one day
he said decide what you want
Do you want to expand your parameters
or play museums like some dilettante

I fired him on the spot
he got red and called me a rat
It was the worst word that he could think of
And I've never seen him like that
It's work, I thought he said it's just work

Andy said a lot of things
I stored them all away in my head
Sometimes when I can't decide what I should do
I think what would Andy have said

He'd probably say you think too much
That's 'cause there's work that you don't want to do
It's work, the most important thing is work
It's work, the most important thing is work

Trouble With Classicists

The trouble with a classicist he looks at a tree
That's all he sees, he paints a tree
The trouble with a classicist he looks at the sky
He doesn't ask why, he just paints a sky

The trouble with an impressionist, he looks at a log
And he doesn't know who he is, standing, staring, at this log
And surrealist memories are too amorphous and proud
While those downtown macho painters are just alcoholic

The trouble with impressionist is X4

The trouble with personalities, they're too wrapped up in style
It's too personal, they're in love with their own guile
They're like illegal aliens trying to make a buck
They're driving gypsy cabs but they're thinking like a truck

The trouble with personalities is X4

I like the druggy downtown kids who spray paint walls and trains
I like their lack of training, their primitive technique
I think sometimes it hurts you when you stay too long in school
I think sometimes it hurts you when you're afraid to be called a fool

The trouble with classicists is X4

Starlight

Starlight open wide, starlight open up you door
This is New York calling with movies on the street
Movies with real people, what you get is what you see
Starlight open wide, Andy's Cecil B. DeMille

Come on L.A. give us a call
We've got superstars who talk, they'll do anything at all
Ingrid, Viva, Little Joe, Baby Jane, and Eddie S.
But you better call us soon before we talk ourselves to death

Starlight open wide everybody is a star
Split screen 8-hour movies, we've got color, we've got sound
Won't you recognize us, we're everything you hate
Andy loves old Hollywood movies, he'll scare you hypocrites to death

You know that shooting up's for real
That person who's screaming, that's the way he really feels
We're all improvising, five movies in a week
If Hollywood doesn't call us, we'll be sick

Starlight open wide, do to movies what you did to art
Can you see beauty in ugliness, or is it playing in the dirt
There are stars out on the New York streets, we want to capture them on film
But if no one wants to see them, we'll make another and another

Starlight let us in that magic room
We've all dreamt of Hollywood, it can't happen too soon
Won't you give us a million dollars the rent is due
And will give you 2 movies and a painting
Starlight open wide !

Faces And Names

Faces and names, I wish they were the same
Faces and names only cause trouble for me
Faces and names

If we all looked the same and we all had the same name
I wouldn't be jealous of you or you jealous of me
Faces and names

I always fall in love with someone who looks
the way I wish that I could be
I'm always staring at someone who hurts
And the one they hurt is me

Faces and names, to me they're all the same
If I looked like you and you looked like me
There'd be less trouble you see

Faces and names, I wish they'd go away
I'd disappear into that wall and never talk
Faces and names

I wish I was a robot or a machine
Without a feeling or a thought
People who want to meet the name I have
Are always disappointed when they meet me

Faces and names, I wish they were the same
Faces and names only cause problems for me
Faces and names

I'd rather be a hole in the wall, looking out on the other side
I'd rather look and listen, listen and not talk
To faces and names

If I had a breakdown when I was a kid
I lost my hair when I was young
If you dress older when you're not
As your really age you look the same

If we all looked the same, we wouldn't play these games
Me dressing for you and you dressing for me
Undressing for me

Faces and names, if they all were the same
You wouldn't be jealous of me or me jealous of you
Me jealous of you, me jealous of you

Your face and your name, your face and your name
Faces and names, faces and names

Images

I think images are worth repeating
images repeated from a painting
Images taken from a painting
from a photo worth re-seeing

I love images worth repeating
project them upon the ceiling
Multiply them with silk screening
see them with a different feeling

Images, oh, images
Images, oh, images

Some say images have no feeling
I think there's a deeper meaning
Mechanical precision or so it's seeming
instigates a cooler feeling

I love multiplicity of screenings
things born anew display new meanings
I think images are worth repeating
and repeating and repeating

Images, oh, images
Images, images

I'm no urban idiot savant
spewing paint without any order
I'm no sphinx, no mystery enigma
what I paint is very ordinary

I don't think I'm old or modern
I don't think I think I'm thinking
It doesn't matter what I'm thinking
It's the images that are worth repeating

Ah, repeating, images
Images

If you're looking for a deeper meaning
I'm as deep as this high ceiling
If you think technique is meaning
you might find me very simple

You might think that images boring
Cars and cans and chairs and flowers
You might find me personally boring
Hammer, sickle, Mao Tse Tong

Mao Tse Tong
Images, images, images

I think that it bears repeating
the images upon the ceiling
I love images worth repeating
and repeating and repeating

Images, images
Oh, images, oh, images

Slip Away (A Warning)

Friends have said to lock the door
and have an open house no more
The said the Factory must change
and slowly slip away

But if I have to live in fear
where will I get my ideas
With all those crazy people gone
will I slowly slip away

Still there's no more Billy Name
and Ondine is not the same
Wonton and the Turtle gone
Slowly slip away
Slowly slip away

If I close the Factory door
and don't see those people anymore
If I give in to infamy
I'll slowly slip away

I know it seems that friends are right
Hello daylight, goodbye night
But starlight is so quiet here
Think I'll slowly slip away

What can I do by myself
it's good to here from someone else
It's good to hear a crazy voice
That will not slip away
Will not slip away

If I have to live in fear
my ideas will slowly slip away

If I have to live in fear
I'm afraid my life will slip away

If you can't see me past my door
Why your thoughts could slowly slip away

If I have to lock the door
another life exists no more slip away

Friends have said to lock the door
Watch out for who comes through the door
The said the Factory must change

But I don't

It Wasn't Me

It wasn't me who shamed you, it's not fair to say that
You wanted to work I gave you a chance at that
It wasn't me who hurt you, that's more credit that I'm worth
Don't threaten me with the things you'll do to you

It wasn't me who shamed you, it wasn't me who brought you down
You did it to yourself without any help from me
It wasn't me who hurt you, I showed you possibilities
The problems you had were there before you met me

I didn't say this had to be
You can't blame these things on me
It wasn't me, it wasn't me, it wasn't me
I know she's dead, it wasn't me

It wasn't me who changed you, you did it to yourself
I'm not an excuse for the hole you dropped in
I'm not simple minded but I'm not father to you at all
Death exists but you do things to yourself

I never said give up control
I never said stick a needle in your arm and die
It wasn't me, it wasn't me, it wasn't me
I know she's dead but it wasn't me

It wasn't me who shamed you, who covered you with mud
You did it to yourself without any help from me
You act as I could've told you or stopped you like some god
But people never listen and you know that that's a fact

I never said slit your wrists and die
I never said throw your life away
It wasn't me, it wasn't me, it wasn't me
You're killing yourself, you can't blame me

I Believe

Valerie Solanis took the elevator
got off at the 4th floor
Valerie Solanis took the elevator
got off at the 4th floor
She pointed the gun at Andy saying
you cannot control me anymore

I believe there's got to be some retribution
I believe an eye for an eye is elemental
I believe that something's wrong if she's alive right now

Valerie Solanis took three steps
pointing at the floor
Valerie Solanis waved her gun
pointing at the floor
From inside her idiot madness spoke
and bang, Andy fell onto the floor

I believe life's serious enough for retribution
I believe being sick is no excuse and
I believe I would've pulled the switch on her myself

When they got him to the hospital
his pulse was gone they thought that he was dead
His guts were pouring from his wounds
onto the floor they thought that he was dead
Not until years later would
the hospital do to him what she could not, what she could not

"Where were you, you didn't come to see me"
Andy said, "I think I died, why didn't you come to see me"
Andy said, "it hurt so much, they took blood from my hand"

I believe there's got to be some retribution
I believe there's got to be some retribution
I believe we are all the poorer for it now

Visit me, visit me
Visit me, visit me
Visit me, why didn't you visit me
Visit me, why didn't you visit me
Visit me, visit me
Visit me, why didn't you visit me

Nobody But You

I really care a lot
although I look like I do not
Since I was shot
there's nobody but you

I know I look blase (* accented on "e")
party Andy's what the papers say
At dinner I'm the one who pays
for a nobody like you

Nobody but you, a nobody like you
Since I got shot, there's nobody but you

Won't you decorate my house
I'll sit there quiet as a mouse
You know me I like to look a lot
at nobody like you

I'll hold your hand and slap my face
I'll tickle you to your disgrace
Won't you put me in my proper place
a nobody like you

Sundays I pray a lot
I'd like to wind you up and paint your clock
I want to be what I am not
for a nobody like you

The bullet split my spleen and lung
the doctors said I was gone
Inside I've got some shattered bone
for nobody but you

Nobody but you, a nobody like you
Shattered bone, for nobody but you

I'm still not sure I didn't die
and if I'm dreaming I still have bad pains inside
I know I'll never be a bride
to nobody like you

I wish I had a stronger chin
my skin was good, my nose was thin
This is no movie I'd ask to be in
with a nobody like you


Nobody like you, a nobody like you
All my life

It's been nobodies like you

A dream

It was a very cold clear fall night.
I had a terrible dream the other night. Billy Name and Brigid were
playingunder my stair case on the secaond floor about two o'clock
in the morning I woke up because Amos and Archie had started barking.
That made me very angry because I wasn't feeling well and I told them.
I was very cross the real me, that they just better remenber waht
happened to Sam the Bad Cat that was left at home and got sick and went pussy heaven.
It was a very cold clear fall night. Some snowfalkes were falling,
gee it was so beautiful, and so I went to get my camera to take some
pictures. And then I was taking the pictures but the exposure thing
wasn't right and I was going to call Fred or Gerry to find out how
to get it set but oh it was late and then I remembered they were still
probably at dinner and anyway I felt really bad and didn't want to
talk to anybody anyway but the snowflakes were so beautiful and real
looking and I really wanted to hold them. And that's when I heard
the voices from down the hall near the stairs. So I got a flashlight
and I was scared and I went out into the hallway. There's been all
kinds of troubles lately in the neighborhood and someone's got to
bring home the bacon and anyway there were Brigid and Billy playing.
And under the stair case was a little meadow sort of like the park at
23rd street where all the young kids go and play frisbee, gee that
must be fun, maybe we should do an article on that in the magazine,
butthey'll just tell me I'm stupid and it won't sell, but I'll just
hold my ground this time, I mean it's my magazine isn't it?
So I was thinking that as the snowflakes fell and I heard those
voices having so much fun. Gee it would be so great to have some
fun. So I called Billy, but either he didn't hear me or he didn't
want to answer which was so strange because even if I don't like
reunions I've always loved Billy. I'm so gald he's working I mean
it's different than Ondine. He keeps touring with those movies and
he doesn't even pay us and the film, I mean the film's just going
to disintegrate and then waht. I mean he's so normal off of drugs.
I just don't get it.
And then I saw John Cale. And he's been looking really great. He's
been coming by the office to exercise with me. Ronnie said I have
a muscle but he's been really mean since he went to AA. I mean what
does it mean when you give up drinking and then you're still so mean.
He says I'm being lazy but I'm not, I'm just can't find any ideas.
I mean I'm just not, let's face it, going to get any ideas up at the
office. And seeing John made me think of the Velvets and I had been
thinking about them when I was on St. Marks Place going to that
new gallery those sweet new kids have opened, but the thought I
was old, and then I saw the old Dom, the old club where we did our
first shows. It was so great. And I don't understand about that
Velvet's first album. I mean I did the cover and I was the producer
and I always see it repacaged and I've never gotten a penny from it.
How could that be. I should call Henry, but it was good seeing John,
I did a cover for him, but I did in black and white and he change
it to color. It would have been worth more if he'd left it my way
but you can never tell any body anything, I've leaned that.
I treid calling again to Billy and John but they wouldn't recognize
me it was like I wasn't there. Why won't they let me in. And then
I saw Lou I'm so mad at him. Lou Reed got married and didn't invite me.
I mean is it because he thought I'd bring too many people. I don't
get it. he could have at least called. I mean he's doing so great.
Why doesn't he call me? I saw him at the MTV show and he was one row
away and he didn't even say hello. I don't get it. You know I hate Lou
I really do. He won't even hire us for his videos. And I was proud of him.
I was so scared today. There was blood leaking thought my shirt
from those old scars from being shot. And the corset I wear to keep
my insides in was hurting. And I did three sets of fifteen pushups and
four sets of ten situps. But then my insides hurt and I saw drops of
blood on my shirt and I remember the doctors saying I was dead. And
then later they had to take blood out of my hand 'couse they ran out
or veins but then all this thinking was making me an old grouch and
you can't do anything anyway so if they wouldn't let me play with
them in my own dream I was just going to have to make another and
another and another. Gee wouldn't it be funny if I died in this dream
before I could make another one up.
And Nobody Calld.

Forever Changed

Train entering the city
I lost myself and never come back
Took a trip around the world, and never came back
Black silhouettes, crisscrossed tracks, never came back

Forever changed X2

You might think I'm frivolous, uncaring and cold
You might think I'm frivolous, depends on your point of view
Society andy, who paints and records them
The high and the low, never turn back

Forever changed X4

Got to get to the city, get a job
Got to get some work, to see me through
My old life's behind, I see you quickly receding
My life's disappearing, disappearing from view

Hong Kong, and I was changed
Burma and Thailand, and I was changed
A few good friends, to see me through
Henry and Brigid, to see me through
Only art, to see me through
Only heart, to see me through
My old life's disappearing, just feelin' from view

Forever changed X2
I was, forever changed

Hello It's Me

Andy it's me, haven't seen you in a while
I wished I talked to you more when you were alive
I thought you were self-assured when you acted shy
Hello it's me

I really miss you, I really miss your mind
I haven't heard ideas like that in such a long, long time
I loved to watch you draw and watch you paint
But when I saw you last, I turned away

When Billy Name was sick and locked up in his room
You asked me for some speed, I though it was for you
I'm sorry that I doubted your good heart
Things always seem to end before they start

Hello it's me, that was a great gallery show
Your cow wallpaper and your floating silver pillows
I wish I paid more attention when they laughed at you
Hello it's me

"Pop goes pop artist," the headline said
"Is shooting a put-on, is Warhol really dead ?"
You get less time for stealing a car
I remember thinking as I heard my own record in a bar

They really hated you, now all that's changed
But I have some resentments that can never be unmade
You hit me where it hurt I didn't laugh
Your Diaries are not a worthy epitaph

Oh well now Andy, guess we've got to go
I hope some way somehow you like this little show
I know it's late in coming but it's the only way I know
Hello it's me, goodnight Andy

Goodbye, Andy

Magic & Loss

What's Good - The Thesis

Life's like a mayonnaise soda
And life's like space without room
And life's like bacon and ice cream
That's what life's like without you

Life's like forever becoming
But life's forever dealing in hurt
Now life's like death without living
That's what life's like without you

Life's like Sanskrit read to a pony
I see you in my mind's eye strangling on your tongue
What's good is knowing such devotion
I've been around - I know what makes things run

What good is seeing eye chocolate
What good's a computerized nose
And what good was cancer in April
Why no good - no good at all

What good's a war without killing
What good is rain that falls up
What good's a disease that won't hurt you
Why no good, I guess, no good at all

What good are these thoughts that I'm thinking
It must be better not to be thinking at all
A styrofoam lover with emotions of concrete
No not much, not much at all

What's good is life without living
What good's this lion that barks
You loved a life others throw away nightly
It's not fair, not fair at all

What's good ?
Life's good -
But not fair at all

Power And Glory - The Situation

I was visited by The Power and The Glory
I was visited by a majestic hymn
Great bolts of lightning
lightning up the sky
Electricity flowing through my veins

I was captured by a larger moment
I was seized by divinity's hot breath
Gorged like a lion on experience
Powerful from life
I wanted all of it -
Not some of it

I saw a man turn into a bird
I saw a bird turn into a tiger
I saw a man hang from a cliff by the tips of his toes
in the jungles of the Amazon
I saw a man put a red hot needle through his eye
turn into a crow and fly through the trees
swallows hot coals and breathe out flames
and I wanted this to happen to me

We saw the moon vanish into his pocket
We saw the stars disappear from sight
We saw him walk across water into the sun
while bathed in eternal light
We spewed out questions waiting for answers
creating legends, religions and myths
Books, stories, movies and plays
all trying to explain this

I saw a great man turn into a little child
The cancer reduced him to dust
His voice growing weak as he fought for his life
with a bravery few men know
I saw isotopes introduced into his lungs
trying to stop the cancerous spread
And it made me think of Leda and The Swan
and gold being made from lead
The same power that burned Hiroshima
causing three legged babies and death
Shrunk to the size of a nickel
to help him regain his breath
And I was struck by The Power and The Glory
I was visited by a majestic Him
Great bolts of lightning lighting up the sky
as the radiation flowed through him
He wanted all of it
Not some of it

Magician - Internally

Magician Magician take me upon your wings
and ... gently roll the clouds away
I'm sorry so sorry I have no incantations
only words to help sweep me away

I want some magic to sweep me away
I want some magic to sweep me away
I want to count to five
turn around and find myself gone
Fly through the storm
and wake up in the calm

Release me from the body
from this bulk that moves beside me
Let me leave this body far away
I'm sick of looking at me
I hate this painful body
that disease has slowly worm away

Magician take my spirit
inside I'm young and vital
Inside I'm alive please take me away
So many things to do - it's too early
For my life to be ending
For this body to simply rot away

I want some magic to keep me alive
I want a miracle ... I don't want to die
I'm afraid that if I go to sleep I'll never wake
I'll no longer exist
I'll close my eyes and disappear
and float into the mist

Somebody ... please hear me
my hand can't hold a cup of coffee
My fingers are weak - things just fall away
Inside I'm young and pretty
Too many things unfinished
My very breath taken away

Doctor you're no magician - and I am no believer
I need more than faith ... can give me now
I want to believe in miracles - not just belief in numbers
I need some magic to take me away

I want some magic to sweep me away
Visit on this starlit night
replace the stars the moon the light - the sun's gone
Fly me through this storm
and wake up in the calm ...
I fly right through this storm
and ... I ... Wake ... Up ... In ... The ... Calm

Sword Of Damocles - Externally

I see The Sword of Damocles is right above your head
They're trying a new treatment to get you out of bed
But radiation kills both bad and good
it can not differentiate
So to cure you they must kill you
The Sword of Damocles hangs above your head

Now I have seen lots of peoples die
from car crashes or drugs
Last night on 33rd st. I saw a kid get hit by a bus
Bus this drawn out torture over which part of you lives
is very hard to take
To cure you they must kill you
The Sword of Damocles above your head

That mix of morphine and dexedrine
we use it on the street
It kills the pain and keeps you up
your very soul to keep
But this guessing game has its own rules
the good don't always win
and might makes right
The Sword of Damocles
is hanging above your head

It seems everything's done that must be done
from over here though things don't seem fair
But there are things that we can't know
maybe there's something over there
Some other world that we don't know about
I know you hate that mystic shit
It's just another way of seeing
The Sword of Damocles above your head

Goodby Mass - In A Chapel Bodily Termination

Sitting on a hard chair try to sit straight
Sitting on a hard chair this moment won't wait
Listening to the speakers they're talking about you
Look at all the people all the people you know

Sitting with my back straight it becomes hard to hear
Some people are crying it becomes hard to hear
I don't think you'd have liked it you would have made a joke
You would have made it easier you'd say "tomorrow I'm smoke"

Sitting on a hard chair how far we have come
Trying hard to listen to your friends who have come
Some of them are famous and some are just like me
Trying hard to listen trying hard to see

Sitting in a hard chair it's over time to stand
Some people are crying I turn to grab your hand
It's your daughter saying thank you
You, you would have made a joke
"Isn't this something," you say, "tomorrow I'm smoke"

Cremation - Ashes To Ashes

Well the coal black sea waits for me me me
The coal black sea waits forever
The waves hit the shore
Crying more more more
But the coal black sea waits forever

The tornados come up the coast they run
Hurricanes rip the sky forever
Through the weathers change
the sea remains the same
The coal black sea waits forever

There are ashes split through collective guilt
People rest at sea forever
Since they burnt you up
Collect you in a cup
For you the coal black sea has no terror

Will your ashes float like some foreign boat
or will they sink absorbed forever
Will the Atlantic Coast
have its final boast
Nothing else contained you ever

Now the coal black sea waits for me me me
The coal black sea waits forever
When I leave this joint
at some further point
The same coal black sea will it be waiting

Dreamin' - Escape

If I close my eyes I see your face and I'm not without you
If I trying hard and concentrate I can still hear you speak
I picture myself in your room by the chair
you're smoking a cigarette
If I close my eyes I can see your face you're saying, "I missed you"
Dreamin' - I'm always dreamin'

If I close my eyes I can smell your perfume you look and say "Hi baby"
If I close my eyes pictures from China still hang from the wall
I hear the dog bark I turned and say, "what were you saying?"
I pictured you in the red chair inside the pale room

You sat in your chair with a tube in your arm - you were so skinny
You were still making jokes I don't know what drugs they had you on
You said, " I guess this is not the time for long term investments"
You were always laughing but you never laughing at me

They say in the end the pain was so bad that you were screaming
Now you were no saint but you deserved better than that
From the corner I watch them moving things from your apartment
But I can picture you red chair and pale room inside my head

If I close my eyes I see your face and I'm not without you
If I try hard and concentrate I can gear your voice saying,
"Who better than you"
If I close my eyes I can't believe that I'm here without you
Inside your pale room your empty red chair and my head
Dreamin' , I'm always dreamin'

No Chance - Regret

It must be nice to be steady, it must be nice to be firm
It must be nice never to move off the mark
It must be nice to be dependable and never let anyone down
It must be great to be all the things you're not
It must be great to be all the things that I'm not

I see you in the hospital your humor is intact
I'm embarrassed by the strength I seem to lack
If I was in your shoes
so strange that I'm not
I'd fold up in a minute and a half
and I didn't get a chance to say goodbye

It must be nice to be normal it must be nice to be cold
It must be nice not to have to go oh up or down
But me I'm all emotional no matter how I try
you're gone and I'm still here alive
and I didn't get a chance to say goodbye
No - I didn't get a chance to say goodbye

There are things we say we wish we knew and in fact we never do
But I'd wish I'd known that you were going to die
Then I wouldn't feel so stupid, such a fool that I didn't call
And I didn't get a chance to say goodbye
I didn't get a chance to say goodbye

No there's no logic to this - who's picked to stay or go
If you think too hard it only makes you mad
But your optimism made me think you really had it beat
So I didn't get a chance to say goodbye
I didn't get a chance to say goodbye

Warrior King - Revenge

I wish I was the warrior king in every language that I speak
Lord over all that I survey and all that I see I keep
Power omnipresent undiminished uncontrolled
with a message violent fury at the center of my soul

I wish I was a warrior king inscrutable benign
with a faceless charging power always at my command
Footsteps so heavy that the world shakes
My rage instilling fear
Yet cautious firm but fair and good
The perfect Warrior King

I wish I installed angles in every subject's house
Agents of my goodness no one would be without
A steak on every plate a car for every house
and if you ever crossed me
I'd have your eyes put out

You don't exist without me without me you don't exist
And if logic won't convinced you then there's always this
I'm bigger, smarter, stronger, tough
yet sensitive and kind
And though I could crush you like a bug
it will never cross my mind

It wouldn't cross my mind to your neck
or rip out your vicious tongue
it wouldn't cross my mind to snap your leg like a twig
or squash you like some slug
You are a violent messenger
and I'm not above your taunts
And if you hit me you know I'll kill you
because I'm the Warrior King

Harry's Circumcision - Reverie Gone Astray

Looking in the mirror Harry didn't like what he saw
The cheeks of his mother the eyes of his father
As each day crashed around him the future stood revealed
He was turning into his parents
The final disappointment

Stepping out of the shower Harry stared at himself
His hairline receding the slight overbite
He picked up the razor to begin his shaving
and thought oh I wish I was different

I wish I was stronger I wish I was thinner
I wish I didn't have this nose
These ears that stick out remind me of my father
and I don't want to be reminded at all
The final disappointment

Harry looked into the mirror thinking of Vincent Van Gogh
and with a quick swipe lopped off his nose
And happy with that he made a slice where his chin was
He's always wanted a dimple
The end of all illusion
Then peering down straight between his legs
Harry thought of the range of possibilities
A new face a new life no memories of the past
and slit his throat from ear to ear

Harry woke up with a cough the stitches made his wince
A doctor smiled at him from somewhere across the room
Son we saved your life but you'll never look the same
And when he heard that, Harry had to laugh
Although it hurt Harry had to laugh
The final disappointment

Gassed And Stoked - Loss

Well, you covered your tracks
and now I can't see you
You had your ashes scattered at sea
There's no grave to visit no tombstone to look at
You were in the NY Times obituary
There's no record no tape no book no movie
Some photographs and some memories
Sometime I dial your photo number by mistake
and this is what I hear

This is no longer a working number baby
Please redial your call
This is no longer a working number
Your party doesn't live here anymore
This is no longer a working number
if you still require help
Stay on the line and an operator
will try to bail you out

I knew I should have seen you that Thursday
I knew I shouldn't left
But you sounded so good your spirits so up
I thought I'd see you next week
I say over and over if I had half a brain
if I had half a brain in my head
I wouldn't sit here dialing a wrong number
and listening to what some recording said

I knew I should have written, written things down
I always say I'll never forget
Who can forget a one-eye pilot
Who's a concert pianist
A 0painter a poet songwriter supreme
My friends are blending in my head
They're melting into one great spirit
and that spirit isn't dead

Now I may not remember everything that you said
But I remember all the sings you've done
And not a day goes by not an hour
when I don't try to be like you
You were gassed, stoked and rarin' to go
and you were that way all the time
So I guess you know why I'm laughing at myselves
every time I dial the wrong line

This is no longer a working number baby

Power And Glory Part 2 - Magic Transformation

I was visited by The Power and The Glory
I was visited by a majestic hymn
Great bolts of lightning
lightning up the sky
Electricity flowing through my veins

I was captured by a larger moment
I was seized by divinity's hot breath
Gorged like a lion on experience
Powerful from life
I wanted all of it -
Not some of it

I saw a man turn into a bird
I saw a bird turn into a tiger
I saw a man hang from a cliff by the tips of his toes
in the jungles of the Amazon
I saw a man put a red hot needle through his eye
turn into a crow and fly through the trees
swallows hot coals and breathe out flames
and I wanted this to happen to me ...
I wanted all of it -
Not some of it

We saw the moon vanish into his pocket
We saw the stars disappear from sight
We saw him walk across water into the sun
while bathed in eternal light
We spewed out questions waiting for answers
creating legends, religions and myths
Books, stories, movies and plays
all trying to explain this
I wanted all of it -
Not some of it

I saw a great man turn into a little child
The cancer reduced him to dust
His voice growing weak as he fought for his life
with a bravery few men know
I saw isotopes introduced into his lungs
trying to stop the cancerous spread
And it made me think of Leda and The Swan
and gold being made from lead
The same power that burned Hiroshima
causing three legged babies and death
Shrunk to the size of a nickel
to help him regain his breath
And I was struck by The Power and The Glory
I was visited by a majestic Him
Great bolts of lightning shooting up his veins
as the radiation flowed through him
He wanted all of it
Not (just) some of it

Magic And Loss - The Summation

When you pass through the fire
you pass through humble
You pass through a maze of self doubt
When you pass through humble
the lights can blind you
Some people never figure that out
You pass through arrogance you pass through hurt
You pass through an ever present past
and it's best not to wait for luck to save you
Pass through the fire to the light

As you pass through the fire
your right hand waving
there are things you have to throw out
That caustic dread inside your head
will never help you out
You have to be very strong
'cause you'll start from zero
over and over again
And as the smoke clears
there's an all consuming fire
lying straight ahead

They say no one person can do it all
but you want to in your head
But you can't be Joyce
so what is left instead
You're stuck with yourself
and a rage that can hurt you
You have to start at the beginning again
And just this moment
This wonderful fire started up again

When you pass through humble
when you pass through sickly
When you pass through
I'm better than you all
When you pass through
anger and self deprecation
and have the strength to acknowledge it all
When the past makes you laugh
and you can savor the magic
that let you survive your own war
You find that that fire is passion
and there's a door up ahead not a wall

As you pass through fire as you pass through fire
trying to remember its name
When you pass through fire licking at your lips
you cannot remain the same
And if the building' burning
move towards that door
but don't put the flames out
There's a bit of magic in everything
and then some loss to even things out

Set The Twilight Reeling

Egg Cream

When I was a young man - no bigger than this
A chocolate egg cream was not to be missed
Some U Bet's Chocolate Syrup, seltzer water mixed with milk
Stir it up into a heady fro - tasted just like silk

You scream, I steam, We all want Egg Cream ...

Now you can go to Junior's, Dave's on Canal St.
And I think there's Ken's in Boston
There must be something in L.A.
But Becky's on Kings Highway
Was the Egg Cream of choice
And if you don't believe me
Go ask any of the boys

You scream, I steam, We all want Egg Cream ...

The only good thing I remember about P.S.92
Was the Egg Cream served at Becky's
It was a fearsome brew
For fifty cents you got a shot - chocolate bubbles up your nose
That made it easier to deal with knife flights
and kids pissing in the street

You scream, I steam, We all want Egg Cream ...

So the next time you're in Brooklyn - Please say hello for me
At Totonno's for Pizza and ice cream at Al and Shirley's
But mostly you go to Becky's - sit in a booth and say hello
And have two chocolate Egg Cream - one to stay and go

You scream, I steam, We all want Egg Cream ...

NYC Man

It can only lead to trouble if you break my heart
If you accidentally crush it on the ides of March
I'd prefer you were straight forward
You don't have to go through all of that
I'm a New York city man, baby
Say "go" and that is that

New York city man, you just say "go" and that is that
I'm a New York city man, you just say "go" and that is that

It's far too complicated to make up a lie
That you'd have to remember and really why
I wouldn't want to be around you
If you don't want to have me around
I'm a M-A-N-N man
Slink your eyes and I'll gone

I'm a M-A-N-N man, slink your eyes, honey, I love you, and I'll gone
New York city man, slink your eyes and I'll gone

Brutus made a pretty speech but Caesar was betrayed
Lady Macbeth went crazy but Macbeth ended slain
Ophelia and Desdamona dead leaving Hamlet in a play
But I'm no Lear with blinded eyes
Say " go " and I am gone

The stars have shut their eyes up tight
The earth has changed it's course
A Kingdom sits on a black knight's back
As he tries to mount a white jeweled horse
While a clock full of butterflies on the hour
Releases a thousand moths
You say " leave" and I'll be gone
Without any remorse
No letters faxes phones or tears
There's a difference between
Bad and worse

I'm a New York city man, blink your eyes and I'll be gone
New York city - man, blink your eyes and I'll be gone

New York city, I love you, New York city man
New York city, I love you, blink your eyes and I'll be gone
Just a little grain of sand
New York city, ooohhh, I love you
New York city, baby, blink your eyes and I'll be gone
I love you ...

Finish Line

Wind blows snow outside my windows
Crowd below runs wild in the streets
Two rented brothers race down two separate alleys
Heading for the finish line

Down in the train yard out by the stockyard
Butchers with aprons hack meat in the snow
Blood has the brothers pulsing with envy
Heading for the finish line

Two rented brothers. Their faces keep changing
Just like these feelings I have for you
And nothing's forever not even five minutes
When you're headed for the finish line

Down in the depot out by the meat rack
Down by the tunnels surrounding the jail
Prisoners are marching in squares and in circles
They're heading for the finish line

They're lining up for Noah's Ark
They're stabbing each other in the dark
Saluting a flag made of some rich guy's socks
Heading for the finish line

Close to the line the ice is cracking
Two rented feelings sitting in the stands
Two mothers, two fathers and both of them are paid for
All of a sudden it comes back to me

Just up ahead is the finish line
Two rented referees and two checkered rags
Out of the corner of my eye comes a
Dark horse with black wings
Headed for the finish line

I'm five years old the room is fuzzy
I think there's also a very young girl
It's hard to remember what happened exactly
As I'm staring at the finish line
First came fire then came light
Then came feeling then cane sight

Trade In

I met a new me at 8 am
The other one got lost
This was not a trade in
Although I wouldn't believe the cost
I woke up crying as we said goodbye
Me an my old self
Each day he vanished more and more
As I became someone else

He actually was murdered I had taken him apart
But when I put him back together
I couldn't find his heart
It was resting underneath a chair
In a bed of bright tin foil
If I pulled back the flaps
I could still see it beat
I could still hear his voice uncoil

As I said :
I want a trade in
A 14th chance at this life
I've met a woman with a thousand faces
And I want to make her my wife

How could I have been so mistaken
How could I think that it was true
A child that is raised by an idiot
And that idiot then becomes you
How could I believe in a movie
How could I believe in a book
But most of all how could I listen to you
Such an obvious schmuck
A life spent listening to assholes
It's funny but it's true
So get rid of them I said to myself
But first I'm getting rid of you

I want a trade in
A 14th chance at this life
I've met a woman with a thousand faces
And I want to make her my wife

Take me over to the window
My heart said to my head
Please set me on fine
So we can start again
I was so wrong that it's funny
And I can't apologize/ but instead,
You can be everything that I'm not
The second that I die

I want a trade in
The second chance at this life
I've met a woman with a thousand faces
And I want to make her my wife

Hang On To Your Emotions

When your imagination has too much to say
When the chill of the night meets the sweat of the day
And you have trouble understanding what other people have to say
You'd better

hang on to your emotions ...

When a demagogue inside your head has taken charge
And by default what you say or do is criticized
And this litany of failures is recited a thousand times
You'd better

hang on to your emotions ...

Could it be you've never felt like that
That your mind's a cage - inside the cage a cat
That spits and scratches all it can get at
And that's you
And your emotions
Could it be you've never felt like that
Your mind's a cage - inside the cage a rat
Rabidly trying to get it
You

and your emotions
You and your emotions

When your imagination has too much to say
When that facile voice inside your head says give your life away
You might think to ask - how it got that way
What books it has read - that make it that way
And where it got the right - to speak to anyone that way
You'd better

hold on to your emotions
Hold on to your emotions

When a night city's breeze blows across the room
And a 5 am moon and sun start their swoon
You hear your lover's breath
And not a moment too soon
You get to

release all your emotions ...

Sex With Your Parents (Motherfucker) Part 2

I was thinking of things that I hate to do, -sex with your parents
Things you do to me or I do to you, baby, -sex with your parents
Something fatter or uglier than Rush Rambo
Something more disgusting than Robert Dole
Something pink that climbs out of a hole
And there it was - sex with your parents

I was getting so sick of this right wing republican shit
These ugly old man scared of young tit and dick
So I try to think of something that made me sick
And there it was - sex with your parents

Now these old fucks can steal all they want
And they can go and pass laws saying you can't say what you want
And you can't look at this and you can't look at that
And you can't smoke this and you can't snort that
And me baby - I got statistics - I got stats
These people have been to bed with their parents

Now I know you're shocked but hang and have a brew
If you think about it for a minute you know that it's true
They're ashamed and repelled and they don't know what to do
They've had sex with their parents
When they looked into their lovers eyes they saw - mom
In the name of the family values we must ask whose family
In the name of the family values we must ask
Senator
It's has been reported that you have had
Illegal congress with your mother, - sex with your parents
Senator
An illegal congress by proxy is a
Pigeon by any other name, - sex with your parents
Senators you polish a turd
Here in the big city we got a word
For those who would bed their beloved big bird
And make a mockery of our freedoms
Without even using a condom
Without even saying " no "
By god we have a name for people like that
It's - hey motherfucker

HookyWooky

I'm standing with you on your roof
Looking at the chemical sky
All purple blue and oranges, some pigeons flying by
The traffic on canal street so noisy it's a shock
And someone's shooting fireworks
Or a gun on the next block

Ah-ah-ah, I wanna hookywooky with you ...

Traffic's so noisy it's a shock
Sounds like fireworks or a gun on the next block

A hookywooky with you

Your ex-lover Satchel is here from France
Yet another ex
They gather about you like a mother superior
All of you still friends, ah-ah-ah
None of my old flames ever talk to me
When things end for me they end
They take your pants your money your name
But the song still remains

Ah-ah-ah, I wanna hookywooky with you ...

They take your pants your money your name
But the song still remains

I wanna hookywooky with you

You're so civilized it hurts
I guess I could learn a lot
About people plants and relationships
And how not to get hurt a lot
And each lover I meet up your roof
I wouldn't want to throw them off
Into the chemical sky
Down into the streets to die
Under the wheels of a car on Canal Streets
And each lover I meet up on your roof
I wouldn't want to throw them off
Into the chemical sky
Under the wheels of a car to die on Canal streets

Ah-ah- I, I wanna hookywooky with you ...

I wouldn't want to throw them off
Into the chemical sky, down into the streets to die
Under the wheels of a car on Canal streets

Under the wheels of a car on Canal Streets ...

The Proposition

You can't have the flower without the root
You can't have the fire without the soot
Even a stripper needs her red tasseled suit
And we were meant to be

In every war the North needs the south
And everyone knows all assholes have a mouth
Without mystery what would writers talk about
And we were meant to be

An apple needs pits the way melons need seed
Your foot needs your arm and your arm needs your knee
And one of these days I know you will need me
We were meant to be ...

You're mother's an ogre your father's a scamp
You won't see my parents honored on any stamp
But just like a bulb screws into a lamp
We were meant to be

The way the AIDS needs a vaccine
Somewhere a vaccine needs AIDS
The way a victim needs life
A life needs to be saved
And out of all of this
Will come a better way
We were meant to be

So you can go to Europe , Los Angeles or Mars
You can stand on a building throwing cinder blocks on cars
You can practice deep voodoo
But like me you'll see
We were meant to be ...

We were meant to be ...

Adventurer

You're an adventurer
You sail across the oceans
You climb the Himalayas
Seeking truth and beauty as a natural state

You're a queen reborn
Worshipped from above afar
Some see you as an elixir
An elemental natural seeking perfect grace

In a catacomb
Or cave of endless drawings
Prehistoric or religious
Your accomplishments prodigious
Seeking out the perfect tone

Your language so clear
Your voice perfectly turning
As in the city I sit yearning
Blowing rings of smoke from thin cigars
Or driving fast in foreign cars
To capture your remains


You're an adventurer
A turban wet wrapped round your head
On the mountainside they predict your death
Oh how you fooled them all

But subjects are a poor excuse
When what you really want's a muse
An inspirating knowledge of what comes before

Speeds of light
The momentary flicker of a candle in its wicker basket
Smoking wax - Facts!
Did you find that superior knowledge that eluded you in college
Did you find that super vortex that could cause your cerebral cortex
to lose its grip

You're an adventurer
You were out looking for meaning
While the rest of us were steaming in an inspirating urban pit
An adventurer
You enter as I'm dreaming
I wish I'd never wake up
Differentiating scheming from my one true love


You're an adventurer
You love the angles and the cherries
The height and width of levies
The natural bridge and tunnels of the human race

You're an adventurer
Nothing seem to scare you and if it does it won't dissuade you
You just will not think about it
You dismiss it and defocus
You redefine the locus of your time in space - Race!
As you move further from me and though I understand the thinking
And have often done the sane thing I find parts of me gone

You're an adventurer
And though I'll surely miss you
And of course I'll survive without you and maybe good will come of that
But at this point I anticipate some grieving
And although I know your leaving
Is a necessary adjunct to what we both do

An adventurer
Splitting up the atom
Splitting up the once was
Splitting up the essence
Of our star-crossed fate

None who meet you do forget you
My adventurer, my adventurer ...
My adventuress

Riptide

She's out of her mind, like the wind in the storm
Like the ocean in the dawn as it disappears, with the riptide
She's out of her mind, she's pulled away by the moon
She's ripped from her sleep ... As the cold luna sweep gains control

What you gonna do ... With your emotions
Ones you barely recognize
In your sleep I heard your screaming
"This is not voluntary! This is not voluntary !
If this is life I'd rather die !"

In the riptide ...

She's out of her mind, riptide
Like a muscle that swells
You know when you trip
Whether you're well or sick
Your body aches
She's out with the tide
Gone to a prisoner's dance
Where a monkey's her date
Eating limbs off a plate with a spoon

What you gonna do with your emotions
Said the seagull to the loon
What you gonna do with your emotions

She said " Please wake me up"
She said " Don't touch me now"
She said " I wish I was dead"

In the riptide

She's out of her mind riptide ... You always win
It happens over and over again rip tide
She's out of her mind like a hurricane's rain
She does not stand a chance at this luna dance riptide

I was thinking of Van Gogh's last painting
The wheatfields and the crows
Is that perhaps what you've been feeling
When you see the ground
As you fall from the shy
As the floors disappears
From beneath your feet riptide

She's going out of her mind ...
With the riptide ...

Set The Twilight Reeling

Take me for what I am ... a star newly emerging
Long simmering explodes ... inside the self is reeling
In the pocket of the heart, in the rushing of the blood
In the muscle of my sex, in the mindful mindless love
I accept the new found man and set the twilight reeling

At 5 am the moon and the sun ... sit set before my window
Light glances off the blue glass we set ... right before the window
And you who accept ... in your soul and your head
What was misunderstood ... what was thought of with dread
A new self is born ... the other self dead
I accept the new found man and set the twilight reeling

A soul singer stands on the stage ... the spotlight shows him sweating
He sinks to one knee ... Seems to cry ... the horn are unrelenting
But as the drums beats he finds himself growing hard
In the microphone's face he sees her face growing large
And the swelling crescendo no longer retards
I accept the new found man and set the twilight reeling

As the twilight sunburst gleams
As the chromium moon it sets
As I lose all my regrets and set the twilight reeling
I accept the new found man and set the twilight reeling

Painting by Dennis, Thanx to him and his talent.

Ecstasy

Paranoia Key Of E

How come you say you will and then you won't
you change your mind and then you say you don't
The mystery is why I play the goat
the mystery you call love

Sometimes you're like an eagle strong like a rock
other times it seems you get unlocked
And all your worst fears come tumbling out
into the street, into the snow

I remember when you had a dream
everything was what it seemed to be
But now nightmares replace everything
and everything you see is wrong

You said we'd meet but you're two hours late
you said you thought someone had picked your gate
So you hid and were afraid to wait
seeing shadows in the snow
Seeing shadows in the snow

Now your friend Godfrey is a perfect choice
one minute down next time rejoice, he seems -
- To have found the perfect voice
paranoia key of E

Let's say everything he says is true
you love me but I cheat on you
And in my bedroom is a female zoo
worse then Clinton in prime time

I swear to you I'm not with Jill or Joyce
or Cyd or Sherry or Darlene or worse
I'm not kissing you while inside I curse
paranoia key of E

Let's play a game the next time we meet, ah
I'll be the hands and you be the feet
And together we will keep the beat
to paranoia key of E

Now, you know mania's in the key of B
psychosis in the key of C
Let's hope that we're not meant to be
in paranoia key of E

Anorexia is in G flat
and F is anything I've left out
Dyslexia, kleptomania and vertigo
patricide A, matricide D the same schizos

Paranoia key of E

Let's have a coda in the key of K
something that only we can play
Maybe we'll light up like a hundred K
paranoia out of key

Paranoia key of E
paranoia key of E

Anorexia, dyslexia
kleptomania, patricide A, matricide D, vertigo, schizos

Paranoia key of E, paranoia
paranoia, paranoia, paranoia key of E
Paranoia, paranoia, paranoia key of E

Mystic Child 

It was only the time of the newly born dead
with wispy cobwebs in your head
the polar moon looked out instead
goin' wild

Liquor shifting through the brain
the manic depressive goes insane
goin' wild
goin' wild

Desperate anger hits the streets
by the foul smelling river by the meat market
goin' wild
mystic child

Goin' wild
mystic child

In the winter with frozen toes
looking out the big windows
to fly
goin' wild

Situation X out of control
my eyes half opened like a mole
who smiles
goin' wild

Who smiles
goin' wild

In the mystic morning where the river meets
the hurdy-gurdy of the hip-hop beat
5 a.m. the viscous street

Oh, wild
goin' wild

Out the window like a flash
fallin' through a rooftop crash
blind
goin' wild

Sick and misty like a pup by the curb
he's throwin' up
wild
like a child

Goin' wild
like a child

If he can't have all that relates
to testify that he is great
he'll cut someone with a broken plate
stand upon the subway grate

And smile
goin' wild
goin' wild
with a smile

Holy morning
sun is up and someone
here has lost his cups

The dawn is tattered all cut up
goin' wild
like a mystic child

Like a mystic child

Sunday morning looking down from the rooftop
goin' wild with a smile
mystic child

Top of the world he's got it made
rings are gold, braids are jade
jumped to the street, he's got it made
goodbye, child

Goodbye, child
mystic child
goin' wild
like a mystic child

Goodbye
goodbye
Goin' wild, ah
goin' wild
Like a mystic child
holy morning
sun is up and someone
Going wild
like a mystic, like a mystic, like a mystic -
- Child
goin'-goin', goin'-goin' wild
Like a mystic child
Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh
Oh-oh-oh, oh
Jumped to the street

Mad 

Mad, you just make me mad
I hate your silent breathing in the night
Sad, you make me sad
when I juxtapose your features I get sad

I know I shouldn't had someone else in our bed
but I was so tired, I was so tired
who would think you'd find a bobby pin
it just makes me mad, makes me mad
It just makes me, makes me -

- Mad

Glad, when I'm gone you're glad
that overwhelming tension dissipates
Oh, tad, you think I'm a baby
nobody likes to here, Why don't you grow up at dawn

I know I shouldn't had someone else in our bed
but I was so tired, so tired
who would think you'd find a bobby pin
it makes me mad, makes me mad
Don't you know it just makes me -

- Mad
it just makes me mad

Dumb, you're dumb as my thumb
in the wistful morning you throw a coffee cup at my head
Scum, you said I'm scum
what a very lovely, feminine thing to do

Bark, why don't you just bark
sit, come, stay are the perfect words meant for you
Ah, ass, you says I'm an ass
you better call 911 'cause I'm gonna hold you tight

I know I shouldn't had someone else in our bed
but I was so tired, so tired
you said you're out of town for the night
and I believed in you, I believed you
And I was so tired, it makes me so mad
it makes me so -

- Mad
it makes me so mad
It just makes me mad
it makes me mad
It makes me mad
it makes me mad
It makes me mad
It makes me mad, ah
dumb

Ecstasy 

They call you ecstasy
nothing ever sticks to you
Not velcro, not scotch tape
not my arms dipped in glue

Not if I wrap myself in nylon
a piece of duct tape down my back
Love pierced the arrow with the twelve
and I can't get you back

Ah, ecstasy
ecstasy
Ah, ecstasy

Across the streets an old Ford, they took off its wheels
the engine is gone
In its seat sits a box
with a note that says, Goodbye Charlie, thanks a lot

I see a child through a window with a bib
and I think of us and what we almost did
The Hudson rocketing with light
the ships pass the statue of liberty at night

They call it ecstasy, ah
ecstasy
Ecstasy, ah
ecstasy

Some men call me St. Ivory
some call me St. Maurice
I'm smooth as alabaster
with white veins runnin' through my cheeks

A big stud through my eyebrow
a scar on my arm that says, Domain
I put it over the tattoo
that contained your name

They called you ecstasy, ecstasy
ecstasy
They call you ecstasy, ecstasy
ecstasy

The moon passing through a cloud
a body facing up is floating towards a crowd
And I think of a time and what I couldn't do
I couldn't hold you close, I couldn't, I couldn't become you

They call you ecstasy, I can't hold you down
I can't hold you up
I feel like that car that I saw today, no radio
no engine, no hood

I'm going to the cafe, I hope they've got music
and I hope that they can play
But if we have to part
I'll have a new scar right over my heart
I'll call it ecstasy

Oh, ecstasy, ecstasy
ecstasy
Ecstasy, ecstasy
ecstasy

Modern Dance 

Maybe I should go and live in Amsterdam
in a side street in a big canal
spend my evenings in the Van Gogh Museum
what a dream, Van Gogh Museum

Maybe its time to see Tangiers
a different life-style some different fears
and maybe I should be Edinburgh
in a kilt in Edinburgh

Doin' a modern dance
doin' a modern dance

Or maybe I should get a farm in Southern France
where the winds are wispy and the villagers dance
and you and I we'd sleep beneath a moon
moon in June and sleep till noon

And maybe you and I could fall in love
regain the spirit that we once had
you'd let me hold you and touch the night
that shines so bright, so bright with fright

Doin' a modern dance
doin' a modern dance

Shit, maybe I could go to Yucatan
where women are women, a man's a man
ah, no one confused, ever loses place
with their place in the human race

Maybe I'm not cut out for city life
the smell of exhaust, the smell of strife
and maybe you don't wanna be a wife
it's not a life being a wife

Doin' a modern dance
doin' a modern dance

So maybe I should go to Tanganyika
where the rivers run, down mountains tall and steep
or go to India to study chants
and lose romance to a mantra's dance

I need a guru, I need some law
explain to me the things we saw
why it always comes to this
it's all downhill after the first kiss

Maybe I should move to Rotterdam
maybe move to Amsterdam
I should move to Ireland, Italy, Spain
Afghanistan where there is no rain

Or maybe I should just learn a modern dance
where roles are shifting the modern dance
you never touch you don't know who you're with
this week, this month, this time of year
this week, this month, this time of year

Doin' a modern dance
you don't know who you're with modern dance
I should move to Pakistan, go to Afghanistan
Dance, you don't know who you're with
dance, you don't know who you're with
modern dance
And maybe you don't wanna be a wife
it's not life being a wife
doin' a modern dance
you never touch you don't know who you're with
Dance, modern dance
the roles are shifting dance
you never touch you don't know who you're with
Dance, modern dance
maybe you don't wanna be a wife

Tatters 

Some couples live in harmony
some do not
Some couples yell and scream
some do not

But what you said was something
that I can't forget
It echoes in my head
like a bullet made of lead

Some people yell and scream
and some do not
Some people sacrifice their lives
and some do not

Some people wait for sleep
to take them away
While others read books endlessly
hoping problems will go away

I know you're hoping everything
works out
Neither one of us is
the type who shouts

You sleep in the bedroom
while I pace up and down the hall
Our baby stares at both of us
wondering which one of us to call

I guess it's true that not
every match burns bright
I guess it's true
not all that I say is right

But what you said still bounces
around in my head
Who thought this could happen to us
when we first went to bed

I'm told in the end
that none of this matters
All couples have troubles
and none of this matters

But what you said
still echoes in my head
And I'm still in the hallway
downstairs sleeping alone instead

I know you don't care
but here's my last thought
Not that it matters
but here's the last thing I thought

Our little thing is lying
here in tatters
And you my dear
don't have any manners

Sad to leave this way
to leave it all in tatters
Saddening to leave this way
to leave it all in tatters
I suppose that we all could say
that nothing of it matters
Still it's sad
to see everything in tatters

Future Farmers Of America 

Born on a farm in a transatlantic moonlight
split like a cord of wood my family broke up
Sold like a piece of steer, a piece of meat, a cow
a breathing piece of shit

Picked for my age, for my strength and make up
called for I was tall, I was big, I could hold up
A tree or a piece of steel I could do
what my fat owner can't

Ah, future farmers of America
future farmers of America
Future farmers of America

Ah
I'm always watching the way his wife looks me over
I have a sex twice as big as her husband's
If I wasn't so large, so strong, so pale
I'd disappear under a bush

Colorless men and ladies of the world unite
kill your master with one cut of your knife
Kill them during sex, kill them during talk
kill them whenever you can

Future farmers of America
future farmers of America
Future farmers of America

These -
- stupid black owners are foreigners to affairs of the heart
look at me, I'll never own land that I work on
Every one of us here shares a surname
this father must die

I was born on the dark cusp of twilight
my father was dark, my mother was light
Look at me, I'm strong
I could crush him in my fist

Ah
I could crush him in my
I could crush him in my
I could crush him in my fist

I could crush him in my
I could crush him in my
I could crush him in my fist

Future farmers of America
I could crush him in my fist
Future farmers of America
I could crush him in my fist
Future farmers of America
I could crush him in my fist

Turning Time Around 

She says, What do you call love
well I call it Harry
Oh, please I'm being serious
what do you call love

Well I don't call it family and I don't call it lust
and as we all know marriage isn't a must
And I suppose in the end, it's a matter of trust
if I had to, I'd call love time

She says, What do you call love
can't you be more specific
What do you call love
is it more than the heart's hieroglyphic

Not for me, time has no meaning, no future, no past
and when you're in love, you don't have to ask
There's never enough time to hold love in your grasp
turning time around

Turning time around
that is what love is
Turning time around
yes, that is what love is

My time is your time when you're in love
and time is what you never have enough of
You can't see or hold it, it's exactly like love

Turning time around
turning time around
Turning time around
turning time around
Turning time around
well I gotta have it
I gotta-gotta-gotta have it

Turning, turning time around
gotta have it, turning time around
Turning, turning time around
turning time around

White Prism 

There's a white prism with phony jism
spread across its face
and the soulful convicts forever interred
lose the smile across their faces
The smile that registered hopes or dreams
has proven just a waste

And I'm the indentured servant
forever in his place
and I'm the indentured servant
forever in his place

I wish I built a cabinet
of shiny bolts and wood
secret draws and hiding places
sculpted out of wood
Secret places, secret lies
in a desk lying alone

Secret letter written to you
to be read when you're alone
secret letter written to you
to be read when you're alone

It says, I'm your indentured servant
I can no longer pretend
that I'm a lover or an equal
I'm not even a friend
I'm not good enough to serve you
I'm not good enough to stay

So it is that I beseech you
to please turn me away
so it is that I beseech you
to please turn me away

Turn me away
turn me away
turn me away

I'm asking you to let me go
it hurts me when you're sad
and I can not do better than this
which must surely make you mad
I'd be better off in your cabinet
or in a prison made of cloth

Crouched beneath your dress I come
shooting little spurts
crouched beneath your dress I come
shooting little spurts

I'm your indentured servant
but even I have pride
in what I make or say or do
although I've lots to hide
I hide from freedom and I hide from you
'cause you've found me out

I belong in prison beneath your legs
in a cabinet that I've built
beneath a candle in a secret drawer
in a prison by a moat

I'm your indentured servant
and I'm asking you to leave
me outside this prison cell
where only you can breathe
I-I-I, I'm your indentured servant
but I'm asking you for this

Please release me from this love
and do it with a kiss
I'm your indentured servant
I'm the one you'll miss

Do it with a kiss
do it with a kiss
do it with a kiss
I'm the one you'll miss

Rock Minuet 

Paralyzed by hatred and a piss ugly soul
if he murdered his father, he thought he'd become whole
While listening at night to an old radio
where they danced to the rock minuet

In the gay bars in the back of the bar
he consummated hatred on a cold sawdust floor
While the jukebox played backbeats, he sniffed coke off a jar
while they danced to a rock minuet

School was a waste, he was meant for the street
but school was the only way, the army could be beat
The two whores sucked his nipples 'til he came on their feet
as they danced to the rock minuet

He dreamt that his father was sunk to his knees
his leather belt tied so tight that it was hard to breathe
And the studs from his jacket were as cold as a breeze
as he danced to a rock minuet

He pictured the bedroom where he heard the first cry
his mother on all fours, ah, with his father behind
And her yell hurt so much, he had wished he'd gone blind
and rocked to a rock minuet

In the back of the warehouse were a couple of guys
they had tied someone up and sewn up their eyes
And he got so excited he came on his thighs
when they danced to the rock minuet

On Avenue B, someone cruised him one night
he took him in an alley and then pulled a knife
And thought of his father as he cut his windpipe
and finally danced to the rock minuet

In the curse of the alley, the thrill of the street
on the bitter cold docks where the outlaws all meet
In euphoria drug in euphoria heat
you could dance to the rock minuet

In the thrill of the needle and anonymous sex
you could dance to the rock minuet

So when you dance hard, slow dancing
when you dance hard, slow dancing
When you dance hard, slow dancing
when you dance to the rock minuet

Baton Rouge 

When I think of you baton rouge
I think of a mariachi band
I think of sixteen and a crisp green football field
I think of a girl I never had

When I think of you baton rouge
I think of a back seat in a car
Windows are foggy and so are we
as the police asked for our I.D.

So helpless
so helpless

Ooohhh, so helpless
ooohhh, so helpless
Ooohhh, so helpless
so helpless

Well I once had a car lost it in a divorce
the judge was a woman of course
She said give her the car and the house and your taste
or else I set the trial date

So now when I think of you baton rouge
and the deep southern belles with their touch
I wonder where love ends and hate starts to blush
in the fields in the swamps in the rush

In the terra-cotta cobwebs of your mind
when did you start seeing me as a spider spinning web
Of malicious intent and you as poor, poor me
at the fire at the joint, this disinterred and broken mount
in the bedroom in the house where we were unmarried

So helpless, so helpless
so helpless
So helpless, so helpless
so helpless

When was I the villa in your heart
putting the brake on your start
you slapped my face and cried and screamed
that's what marriage came to mean
The bitterest ending of a dream

You wanted children and I did not
was that what it was all about
You might get a laugh when you hear me shout
you might get a laugh when you hear me shout
I wish I had


So helpless, so helpless
so helpless
So helpless, so helpless
so helpless

Sometimes when I think of baton rouge
I see us with two and a half strapping sons
One and a half flushed daughters preparing to marry
and two fat grandsons I can barely carry

Daddy, uncle, family gathered there for grace
a dog in a barbecue pit goes up in space
The dream recedes in the morning with a bad aftertaste
and I'm back in the big city worn from the race of the chase
what a waste

So thanks for the card the announcement of child
and I must say you and Sam look great
Your daughter's gleaming in that -
- white wedding dress with pride
sad to say I could never bring that to you that wide smile

So I try not to think of baton rouge
or of a, of a, of a mariachi band
Or of sixteen and a crisp green football field
and the girl, and the girl I never had

So helpless, so helpless
so helpless
So helpless, so helpless
so helpless

Like A Possum 

Good morning, it's possum day
feel like a possum in every way
like a possum

Possum whiskers, possum face
possum breath and a possum taste
ooohhh, like a possum

Possum tales, possum eyes
possum bones, possum thighs
oh, like a possum

Possum shots, possum runs
possum sleeps to possum drums
calm as an angel

Good morning, it's possum day
I feel like a possum in every way
like a possum

Wake up with a possum smile
look at me, look at this smile
like a possum

Things are all right, don't worry about this
my mind's amiss, I've lost the kiss

My smile is leaden, my gait is rubber
and I say as one possum to another like a possum
calm as an angel

The only thing I hope to never see
is another possum in this tree
playing possum

Just like a possum

I got a hole in my heart the size of a truck
it won't be filled by a one-night fuck

Slurping and squeezing ain't it just my luck
got a hole in my heart the size of a truck
the size of a truck

The devil tried to fill me up but my down was high
as the sky is up, ah
ain't that just my luck
calm as an angel

Smoking crack with a downtown flirt
shooting and coming 'til it hurts
calm, calm, ah, calm
calm as an angel

They're mating like apes in the zoo
ah, one for me and one for you
wouldn't it just be lovely

Another useless night in bed, ah, ah
by the Hudson River, the roller-bladers giving head
used condoms float on the river edge's head

Wouldn't it be lovely
wouldn't it be lovely

I got a hole in my heart the size of a truck
it won't be filled by one-night fuck
like a possum
like a possum

Ahhh
calm as an angel

You know me I like to dance a lot
with different selves who cancel out
one another
I'm the only one left standing

One likes muscles, oil and dirt
and the other likes the women with the butt that hurts
like a possum

Devil tried to fill me up
but my down was high as the sky is up
calm as an angel

I got a hole in my heart the size of a truck
and it won't be filled by a one-night fuck
like a possum

You know me I like to drink a lot
and carry on
don't know which self will show up, ah
over the 5 a.m. sun, -

- The moon is shining
over the docks shining
ooohhh, calm as an angel

Girls in the market know what I'm about
they pinch their nipples and they lift their skirts, ah
with a pierced tongue licking below a stained T-shirt

Look at this smile

My mind's amiss

Smoking crack with a downtown flirt
shooting and coming 'til it hurts
calm, calm

Sitting on a curb I throw a rock
at the passing meat market trucks
it's just my luck
I'm the only one left standing

Now you know me I like to drink a lot, ah
only one left standing

The girls in the market know what I'm about
they pinch their nipples and they lift their skirts
licking below a stained T-shirt
calm as an angel

Smoking crack with a downtown flirt
shooting and coming baby 'til it hurts
wouldn't it be, wouldn't it be

Wouldn't it be love
wouldn't it be lovely
calm as an angel

Got a hole in my heart the size of a truck
it won't be filled by one-night fuck

Ain't it just my luck
I got a hole in my heart the size of a truck

Another useless night in bed
walk down the Hudson River getting head
calm, calm, calm, calm, calm as an angel

Don't know why baby, I'm still here strong
and fearless in the outside air
I'm the only one left standing

I'm the only one
the only one
the only one left standing

I'm the only one
I'm the only one
left standing
calm as an angel

I'm the only one
I'm the only one, the only one
left standing
calm as an angel

Shooting an coming 'til it hurts
o'holy morning

Calm as an angel

 Big Sky 

Big sky, big sky holding up the sun
big sky, big sky holding up the moon
Big sky holding down the sea
but it can't hold us down anymore

Big sky holding up the stars
big sky holding Venus and Mars
Big sky catch you in a jar
but it can't hold us down anymore

Big sky, big enormous place
big wind blow all over the place
Big storm wrecking havoc and waste
but it can't hold us down anymore

Ooohhh, big goals, big ambitious goals
big talk, talking till I fold
Big wind talking through torrential love
but it can't hold us down anymore

Big sin, big sin, big original sin
paradise where I've never been
Big snake break the skin
but you can't hold us down anymore

A big house holds a family
a big room it holds you and me
It's a big mess and baby makes three
but you can't hold us down anymore

Big news, they're out of their heads
big-big-big news, let's fuck them instead
There's a big joke, did they think we were monks
but they can't hold us down anymore

A big doll, big enormous eyes
big love holds you in a vise
A big man who cut them down to size
they can't hold us down anymore

Big sky, big sky holding up the sun
big sky holding, holding up the moon
Big sky holding down the sea
but it can't hold us down anymore

Oh, big doll, big enormous eyes
big love holds you in a vise
A big man who cut them down to size, ah
they can't hold us down anymore

Oh-oh, big sky
big sky
Big sky
ah, can't hold us down anymore

The Raven (CD1)

The Conqueror Worm

Young Poe :

Lo! 'T is a gala night
A mystic throng bedecked
Sit in a theater to see
A play of hopes and fears
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres

Mimes, mutter and mumble low
Mere puppets they, who come and go
Disguised as gods
They shift the scenery to and fro
Inevitably trapped by invisible Wo

This motley drama
To be sure
Will not be forgotten

A phantom chased for evermore
Never seized by the crowd
Through they circle
Returning to the same spot
Circle and return to the selfsame spot
Always to the selfsame spot
With much of madness and more of sin
And horror and mimic rout
The soul of the plot
Out
Out are the lights
Out all
And over each dying form
The curtain a funeral pall
Comes with the rush of a storm
The angels haggard and wan
Unveiling and uprising affirm
That the play is the tragedy "Man"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm

Old Poe

Old Poe :

As I look back on my life
If I could have the glorious moment
The wondrous opportunity to comprehend
The chance to see my younger self
One time
To converse
To hear his thoughts

Prologue (Ligiea)

Young Poe:

In the science of the mind there is no point
more thrilling than to notice which I never noticed in schools that in our endeavors
to recall to memory something long-forgotten
we often find ourselves upon the very verge of remembrance
without being in the end able to remember

Under the intense scrutiny of Ligeia's eyes
I have felt the full knowledge
and force of their expression
and yet been unable to possess it
and have felt it leave me as so many other things have left
the letter half-read, the bottle half-drunk
finding in the commonest objects
of the universe a circle of analogies
of metaphors for that expression
which has been willfully withheld from me
the access to the inner soul denied

Eyes blazed with a too-glorious effulgence
pale fingers transparent, waxen, the hue of the grave
Blue veins upon the lofty forehead swelled
and sunk impetuously with the tides of deep emotion
and I saw that she must die
that she was wresting with the dark shadow
Her stern nature had impressed me
with the belief that, to her
death would come without its terrors
but not so
I groaned in anguish at the pitiable spectacle
I would have soothed
I would have reasoned
But she was amid the most convulsive of writhings
Oh, pitiful soul
Her voice more gentle
more low, and yet her words grew wilder of meaning
I reeled, entranced, to a melody more than mortal

She loved me, no doubt
and in her bosom
love reigned as no ordinary passion
But in death only was I impressed
with the intensity of her affection
Her more than passionate devotion amounted to idolatry
How had I deserved to be so blessed
and then cursed with the removal of my beloved
upon the hour of her most delirious musings

In her more than womanly abandonment to a love
all unmerited and unworthily bestowed
I came to realize the principle of her longing
It was a yearning for life
an eager, intense desire for life
which was now fleeing so rapidly away
as she returned solemnly to her bed of death
And I had no utterance capable of expressing it
except to say
Man doth not yield to the angels
nor unto death utterly
save only through the weakness of his feeble will

I became wild with the excitement
of an immoderate does of opium
I saw her raising wine to her lips
or may have dreamed that I saw fall within a goblet
as if from some invisible spring
in the atmosphere of the room
three of four large drops
of a brilliant and ruby-colored fluid
Falling
While Ligeia lay in her bed of ebony
the bed of death
with mine eyes riveted upon her body
Then came a moan
a sob low and gentle but once
I listened in superstitious terror but heard it not again
I strained vision to see any motion in the corpse
but here was not the slightest perceptible
Yet I had heard the noise
and my whole soul was awakened within me
The red liquid fell and I thought, Ligeia lives
and I felt my brain reel
my heart cease to beat
and my limbs go rigid where I sat
In extremity of horror
I heard a vague sound issuing from the region of the bed
Rushing to her I saw
I distinctly saw
a tremor upon her lips
I sprang to my feet and chafed
and bathed the temples and hands but in vain
all color fled
all pulsation ceased
Her lips resumed the expression of the dead
the icy hue, the sunken outline
and all the loathsome peculiarities of that
which for many days has been the tenant of the tomb

And again I sank into visions of Ligeia
And again I heard a low sob
As I looked she seemed to grow taller
What inexpressible madness seized me with that thought?
I ran to touch her
Her head fell, and her clothing crumbled
and there streamed forth huge masses of long disheveled hair
It was blacker
than the raven wings of midnight

Edgar Allan Poe

These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door
He'll tell you tales of horror
Then he'll play with your mind
If you haven't heard of him
You must be deaf or blind

These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door

He'll tell you about Usher
Whose house burned in his mind
His love for his dear sister
Her death would drive him wild
The murder of a stranger
The murder of a friend
The callings from the pits of hell
That never seem to end

These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door
These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door

The diabolic image of the city and the sea
The chaos and the carnage that reside deep within me
Decapitations, poisonings, hellish not a bore
You won't need 3D glasses to pass beyond this door

Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door

No Nosferatu Vincent Price or naked women here
A mind unfurled, a mind unbent is all we have here
Truth, fried orangutans flutter to the stage
Leave your expectations home
And listen to the stories of Edgar Allan Poe

We give you the soliloquy the raven at the door
Flaming pits the moving walls no equilibrium
No ballast, no bombast
The unvarnished truth we've got
Mind swoons guilty
Cooking ravings in a pot

Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door
Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door

Tell-tale heart a rotting cask
A valley of unrest
A conqueror worm devouring souls
Keep the best for last
Rings for Annie Lee
As Poe's buried alive
Regretting his beloved's death in
All her many guises

These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the, not exactly the boy next door
Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door
These are the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
Not exactly the boy next door
Edgar Allan Poe

The Valley Of Unrest

Rowena :

Far away far away
Are not all lovely things far away
As far at least lies that valley
As the bedridden sun in the luminous east
The paralyzed mountains, the sickly river
Are not all things lovely far away
Are not all things lovely far away

It is a valley where time is not interrupted
Where its history shall not be interpreted
Stories of satan's dart of angel wings
Unhappy things
Within the valley of unrest

The sun ray dripped all red
The dell was silent
All the people having gone to war
Leaving no interrogator to mind
The willful looting the pale past knowledge
The sly mysterious stars
The unguarded flowers leaning
The tulips overhead paler
The terror stricken sky
Rolling like a waterfall
Over the horizon's fiery wall
A visage full of meaning

How the unhappy shall confess
As Roderick watches like a human eye
While violets and lilies wave
Like banners in the sky
Hovering over and above a grave
As dew drops on the freshly planted eternal dew
Coming down in gems
There's no use to pretend
Though gorgeous clouds fly
Roderick, like the human eye has closed forever
Far away far away

Roderick, whatever thy image may be
Roderick, no magic shall sever the music from thee
Thou hast bound many eyes in a dreamy sleep
Oh tortured day
The strains still arrive
I hear the bells
I have kept my vigilance
Rain dancing in the rhythm of a shower
Over what guilty spirit to not hear the beating
To not hear the beating heart
But only tears of perfect moan
Only tears of perfect moan

Call On Me

( With Laurie Anderson )

Caught in the crossbow of ideas and journeys
Sit here reliving the other self's mournings
Caught in the crossbow of ideas and dawnings
Stand I

Oh oh oh oh

Reliving the past of the maddening impulse
Violent upheaval, the pure driven instinct
The pure driven murder, the attraction of daring
Stand I

Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call

Rowena :

A wild being from birth
My spirit spurns control
Wondering the wide earth
Searching for my soul
Dimly peering
I would surely find
What could there be more purely bright
In truth's day-star

Ooohhh
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call, call on me
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call

Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call on me
Why didn't you call

The City In The Sea/Shadow

Death has reared himself a throne

In a strange city
Alone

Death has reared himself a throne
In a strange city
Alone
Their shrines and palaces are not like ours
They do not tremble and rot
Eaten with time

Death has reared himself a throne

Lifted by forgotten winds
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie
A crown of stars

In a strange city
Alone

A heaven God does not condemn
But the everlasting shadow
Makes mockery of it all

No holy rays come down
Lights from the lurid deep sea
Stream up the turrets silently
Up thrones, up arbors
Of sculpted ivy and stone flowers
Up domes, up spires
Kingly halls all are melancholy shrines
The columns, frieze and entablature
Chokingly shockingly intertwined
The mast the viol and the vine
Twisted

There amid no earthly moans
Hell rises from a thousand thrones
Does reverence to death
And death does give his undivided time

There are open temples
And graves on a level with the waves
Death looms and looks
Huge
Gigantic
There is a ripple
Now a wave
Towers thrown aside
Sinking in the dull tide
The waves glowing redder
The very hours losing their breath

All the cunning stars
Watching fitfully over night after night of
Matchless ........ Sleep
Matched only with the whole of dream .......
The tell-tale beating of the heart
The ......... Breath
The desire, the pose
One poses upon the precipice
To fall to run to dive to tumble to fall down
Down into the spiral down and then
One sees one's own death
One sees one committing murder or atrocious violent acts
And then across the shadow
Not of man or God
But the shadow resting upon the brazen doorway

There were seven of us there
Who saw the shadow as it came out from among the draperies
But we did not dare behold it
We looked down into the depths of the mirror of ebony
And the apparition spoke
"I am a shadow
And I dwell in the catacombs
Which border
The country of illusion
Hard by the dim plains of wishing"

And then did we start shuddering
Starting from our seats
Trembling
For the tones in the voice of the shadow
Were not the tones of any one man
But of a multitude of beings
And varying in their cadences
From syllable to syllable
Fell duskily upon our ears in the well
Remembered and familiar accents
Of a thousand departed friends

Change

The only thing constantly changing is change
And change is always for the worse
The worm on the hook always eaten by a fish
The fish by bird man or worse
A spot on the lung, a spot on your heart
An aneurism of the soul
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it comes equipped with a curse

The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse

The only thing constantly changing is change
The living only become dead
Your hair falling out, your liver swelled up
Your teeth rot your gums and your chin
Your ass starts to sag, your balls shrivel up
Your cock swallowed up in their sack
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always change on your back

The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse, baby

The only thing constantly changing is change
Ashes to ashes to dusk
The deer and the rabbit, the musk of your hole
Filled up with myriad dread, ooohhh
The dread of the living, the dread of the living
The frightening pulse of the night, ah
The only thing constantly changing is change
It's changes that will kill us with fright

The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always for the worse
The only thing constantly changing is change
The only thing constantly changing is change
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it comes equipped with my curse

The fall of the house of Usher

Edgar:
And then I had a vision

Roderick Usher:
Ah Edgar
Ah Edgar, my dear friend Edgar

Edgar:
It's been a long time, Roderick
I've ridden many miles
It's been a dull and soundless day for autumn
The leaves have lost their autumn glow
and the clouds seem oppressive with their drifting finery

Roderick Usher:
I know, my friend
Though I own so much of this land I find
the country insufferable
I deal only in half pleasures

Edgar:
Speaking of half pleasures
would you care for a tincture of opium?

Roderick Usher:
Nothing would please me more than to smoke
with an old friend

I've experienced the hideous dropping of the veil
the bitter lapse into common life
unredeemed dreariness of thought
I have an iciness, a sickening of the heart

Edgar:
It's true you don't look well, Roderick
but I am your friend
no matter the occasion or position of the stars
I'm glad you wrote me
but I must admit to concern

Roderick Usher:
I cannot contain my heart
Edgar, I look to you for solace
for relief from myself
What I have is constitutional
a family evil, a nervous affection that must surely pass
But I do have this morbid acuteness of senses
I can eat only the most insipid food
clothes only of the lightest texture
The odor of flowers I find oppressive
My eyes cannot bear even the faintest light

Madeline Usher:
[moaning]

Roderick Usher:
Did you hear that?

Edgar:
I hear
I am listening, go on

Roderick Usher:
I shall perish
I will perish in this deplorable folly
I dread the future
Not the events, the results
The most trivial event
causes the greatest agitation of the soul
I do not fear danger except in its absolute effect terror
I find I must inevitably abandon life and reason together
in my struggles with the demon fear

Perhaps you'll think me superstitious
but the physique of this place
it hovers about me like a great body
some diseased outer shell
some decaying finite skin encasing my morale

Edgar:
You mentioned your sister was ill

Roderick Usher:
My beloved sister, my sole companion
has had a long continuing illness
whose inevitable conclusion seems forsworn
This will leave me the last of the ancient race of Ushers

Madeline Usher:
[moaning]

Edgar:
She looks so much like you

Roderick Usher:
I love her in a nameless way
more than I love myself
Her demise will leave me hopelessly
confined to memories and realities of a future
so barren as to be stultifying

Madeline Usher:
[moaning]

Edgar:
Oh, what of physicians?

Roderick Usher:
Ah, they are baffled
Until today she refused bed rest
wanting to be present in your honor
but finally she succumbed to the prostrating power of the destroyer
You will probably see her no more

Edgar:
Sound and music take us to the twin curves of experience
Like brother and sister intertwined
they relieve themselves of bodily contact
and dance in a pagan revelry

Roderick Usher:

I have soiled myself with my designs
I am ashamed of my brain
The enemy is me
and the executioner terror
Music is a reflection of our inner self
unfiltered agony touches the wayward string
The wayward brain confuses itself
with the self-perceived future
and turns inward with loathing and terror
Either by design or thought
we are doomed to know our own end
I've written a lyric

Edgar:
May I hear it?

Roderick Usher:
It is called "The Haunted Palace"

In the greenest of our valleys,
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace --
Snow-white palace -- reared its head.

Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow;
(This -- all this -- was in the olden time long ago)
And every gentle air that dallied,
Along the rampart plumed and pallid,
A winged odor went away.

All wanderers in that happy valley
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically
The sovereign of the realm serene,
A troop of echoes whose sweet duty
Was but to sing
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.

But evil things in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate!
And round about his home the glory,
Is but a dim-remembered story.

Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While, like a ghastly river,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh -- but smile no more.

Nevermore.

Edgar:
It's cold in here

Roderick Usher:
I tell you minerals are sentient things
The gradual yet certain condensation of an atmosphere
of their own about the waters and the walls proves this
Thus the silent yet importunate and terrible influence
which for centuries has molded my family
And now me

Madeline Usher:
[screaming]

Roderick Usher:
Excuse me

Madeline Usher:
[vomiting]

Roderick Usher:
She is gone
Out, sad light
Roderick has no life

I shall preserve her corpse for a fortnight

Edgar:
But Roderick..

Roderick Usher:
I shall place it in a vault facing the lake
I do not wish to answer to the medical men
nor place her in the exposed burial plot of my family
We shall inter her at the proper date
when I am more fully of a right mind
Her malady was unusual
Please do not question me on this

Edgar:
I cannot question you

Roderick Usher:
Then help me now

Madeline Usher:
[moaning]

Edgar:
One would think you twins

Roderick Usher:
We are
We have always been sympathetic to each other
Have you seen this?
It is her

Edgar:
It is a whirlwind
You should not
You must not behold this

Roderick, these appearances which bewilder you are mere electrical phenomena not uncommon
Or perhaps they have their rank origins in the marshy gases of the lake
Please, let's close this casement and I will read and you will listen
Aand together we will pass this terrible night together

What's that?
What is that?
Don't you hear that?

Roderick Usher:
Not hear it?
Yes, I hear it and have heard it many minutes have I heard it?
Oh, pity me miserable wretch
I dared not
Oh no
I dared not speak
We have put her living in the tomb
I have heard feeble movements in the coffin
I thought I heard
I dared not speak
Oh God
I have heard footsteps
Do you not hear them?
Attention
Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart?
Madman
Madman
I tell you she now stands without the door

Madeline Usher :
[moaning and screaming]

The Bed

This is the place where she lay her head
When she went to bed at night
And this is the place our children were conceived
Candles lit the room at night

And this is the place where she cut her wrists
That odd and fateful night
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling

This is the place where we used to live
I paid for it with love and blood
And these are the boxes that she kept on the shelf
Filled with her poetry and stuff

And this is the room where she took the razor
And cut her wrists that strange and fateful night
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling
And I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling

I never would have started if I'd known
That it'd end this way
But funny thing, I'm not at all sad
That it stopped this way
Stopped this way

Perfect Day

( Sung by Antony )

Just a perfect day
Drink sangria in the park
Then later when it gets dark
We go home

Just a perfect day
Feed animals in the zoo
Then later a movie too
And then home

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you
Oh, such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
Just keep me hanging on

Just a perfect day
Problems all left alone
Weekenders on our own
It's such fun

Just a perfect day
You make me forget myself
I thought I was someone else
Someone good

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you
Oh, such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
You just keep me hanging on

The Raven

Poe :

Once upon a midnight dreary
As I pondered, weak and weary
Over many a quaint and curious
Volume of forgotten lore
While I nodded, nearly napping
Suddenly there came a tapping
As of some one gently rapping
Rapping at my chamber door
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered
"tapping at my chamber door
Only this and nothing more."

Muttering I got up weakly
Always i've had trouble sleeping
Stumbling upright my mind racing
Furtive thoughts flowing once more
I, there hoping for some sunrise
Happiness would be a surprise
Loneliness no longer a prize
Rapping at my chamber door
Seeking out the clever bore
Lost in dreams forever more
Only this and nothing more

Hovering my pulse was racing
Stale tobacco my lips tasting
Scotch sitting upon my basin
Remnants of the night before
Came again
Infernal tapping on the door
In my mind jabbing
Is it in or outside rapping
Calling out to me once more
The fit and fury of Lenore
Nameless here forever more

And the silken sad uncertain
Rustling of the purple curtain
Thrilled me, filled me
With fantastic terrors never felt before
So that now, oh wind, stood breathing
Hoping yet to calm my breathing
"'Tis some visitor entreating
Entrance at my chamber door
Some lost visitor entreating
Entrance at my chamber door
This it is, and nothing more."

Deep into the darkness peering
Long I stood there
Wondering fearing
Doubting dreaming fantasies
No mortal dared to dream before
But the silence was unbroken
And the stillness gave no token
And the only word there spoken
Was the whispered name, "Lenore."
This I thought
And out loud whispered from my lips
The foul name festered
Echoing itself
Merely this, and nothing more

Back into my chamber turning
Every nerve within me burning
When once again I heard a tapping
Somewhat louder than before
"surely," said I
Surely that is something at my iron staircase
Open the door to see what threat is
Open the window, free the shutters
Let us this mystery explore
Oh, bursting heart be still this once
And let this mystery explore
It is the wind and nothing more

Just one epithet I muttered as inside
I gagged and shuddered
When with manly flirt and flutter
In there flew a stately raven
Sleek and ravenous as any foe
Not the least obeisance made he
Not a minutes gesture towards me
Of recognition or politeness
But perched above my chamber door
This fowl and salivating visage
Insinuating with its knowledge
Perched above my chamber door
Silent sat and staring
Nothing more

Askance, askew
The self's sad fancy smiles at you I swear
At this savage viscous countenance it wears
Though you show here shorn and shaven
And I admit myself forlorn and craven
Ghastly grim and ancient raven
Wandering from the opiate shores
Tell me what thy lordly name is
That you are not nightmare sewage
Some dire powder drink or inhalation
Framed from flames of downtown lore
Quotes the raven, "nevermore."

And the raven sitting lonely
Staring sickly at my male sex only
That one word
As if his soul in that one word
He did outpour, "pathetic."
Nothing farther than he uttered
Not a feather then he fluttered
Till finally was I that muttered as I stared
Dully at the floor
"other friends have flown and left me
Flown as each and every hope has flown before
As you no doubt will fore the morrow."
But the bird said, "never, more."

Then I felt the air grow denser
Perfumed from some unseen incense
As though accepting angelic intrusion
When in fact I felt collusion
Before the guise of false memories respite
Respite through the haze of cocaine's glory
I smoke and smoke the blue vial's glory
To forget
At once
The base Lenore
Quoth the raven, "nevermore."

"Prophet," said I, "thing of evil
Prophet still, if bird or devil
By that heaven that bend above us
By that God we both ignore
Tell this soul with sorrow laden
Willful and destructive intent
How had lapsed a pure heart lady
To the greediest of needs
Sweaty arrogant dickless liar
Who ascribed to nothing higher
Than a jab from prick to needle
Straight to betrayal and disgrace
The conscience showing not a trace."
Quoth the raven, "nevermore."

"Be that word our sign of parting
Bird or fiend," I yelled upstarting
"get thee back into the tempest
Into the smoke filled bottle's shore
Leave no black plume as a token
Of the slime thy soul hath spoken
Leave my loneliness unbroken
Quit as those have quit before
Take the talon from my heart
And see that I can care no more
Whatever mattered came before
I vanish with the dead Lenore."
Quoth the raven, "nevermore."

But the raven, never flitting
Still is sitting silent sitting
Above a painting silent painting
Of the forever silenced whore
And his eyes have all the seeming
Of a demon's that is dreaming
And the lamplight over him
Streaming throws his shadow to the floor
I love she who hates me more
I love she who hates me more
And my soul shall not be lifted from that shadow
Nevermore

Balloon

( Kate and Anna McGarrigle )

I'm a little balloon and I get puffed up
Squeeze me and bend me it's never enough
Put your lips around me, blow me up
But if you prick me I will pop

I'm a little balloon full and firm
Here is my aft and here is my stern
Here's my lips and here's my hose
Put me down or I will burst

If you prick me I will burst

The Raven (CD2)

Broadway Song

( Steve Buscemi )

Like to thank all you people for showing up tonight
Sorry about the weather
Let's have a big hand for my long time accompianist
Manfred Gooseberry
Hey Goose
Take a bow, relax
Be comfortable
Have a cocktail on the Poo Poo Lounge
And let us entertain you

I'd like to sing you a Broadway song
I hope that you'll all sing along
A little dancing and some sentiment to put your mind at ease

I'd like to play you something low and sexy
Look at our dancers they're so young and pretty, hi Olga
And when we start to groove you can hear the saxophones blow

Ah, show business is just a wonderful thing
All I want is to get down on my knees and sing for you

And let the saxophones blow
Blow baby blow

I'd like to sing you a Broadway song
I hope that you'll all sing along
A little dancing and some sentiment to put your mind at ease

I wanna bring a tear to your eye, oh
Good old Poe don't he make you cry
Ain't it great the way he writes about the mysteries of life

Ah, show business is just a wonderful thing
All I want is to get down on my knees and sing for you

And let the saxophones blow
Blow baby blow

Ah, show business is just a wonderful thing
All I want is to get down on my knees and sing for you

And let the saxophones blow
Blow baby blow baby blow baby blow

Go Goose go

The Tell-Tale Heart Pt. 1

True
Nervous
Very nervous

Madman

Why will you say that I am mad
The disease has sharpened my senses
Not destroyed
Not dulled them

Madman

The eye of a vulture
A pale blue eye
With a film overit

Listen
Observe how healthily
And how calmly I tell this story

He had no passion for the old man
He was never insulted

He loved him

It was the eye the eye the eye

I made up my mind
To take his life forever

Passionless
The eye of a vulture
You should have seen me
How wisely I proceeded
To rid himself of the eye forever
With what dissimulation I went to work

Caution

I turned the latch on his door
And opened it

To work
To practice

I opened his door
And put in a dark lantern

Dark

Slowly I put my head in
Slowly I thrust it until in time Ientered
I was in so far

He was in so far
He could see the old man sleep

And then I undid the lantern so a thin ray
Fell upon the eye

The vulture eye
He did this for seven days
Seven days

But always the eye was closed
And so I could not do the work

And in the day he would greet the old man
Calmly in his chamber

Calmly

Nothing is wrong and all is well

Knock, knock
Who's there

Came night eight

Night eight

I was slower than a watch minute hand
The power that I had with the old man
Not to even dream my secret thoughts

Secret thoughts

My sagacity
I could barely conceal my feelings of triumph

When suddenly the body moved

The body moved

But I went in even further
Pushing the door open even further

Who's there

Who's there

I did not move a muscle
I kept quiet and still

The old man sat up in bed

In his bed

Who's there

I heard a groan
And knew it was a groan of mortal terror
Not pain or grief

Oh no

It was the low stifled sound that arises
From the bottom of the soul
When overcharged with awe
I felt such awe welling up in my own bosom
Deepening with its echo the terrors that distracted me
Knowing what the old man felt and

Pitying him

Although it made me laugh

Ha ha

He'd been lying awake since the first slight noise
He'd been lying awake thinking

Thinking
It is nothing but the wind

The wind

It is nothing but the house settling

The old man stalked with his black shadow

Death approaching

The mournful presence of the unperceived
Causing him to feel my presence

Open the lantern

I saw the ray fall on the eye

On the eye

Blind Rage

Who's that peeping through my door
Sneaking up and down the hall
I can't stand it anymore
I can't stand it anymore

Who's that peeping through my door
Sneaking up and down the hall
I can't stand it anymore
I can't stand it anymore

Blind rage
I'm in a blind rage

Blind rage
Blind rage
Blind rage

Who's that creeping in my room
Blocking out the stars and moon
I fear you will attack me soon
Who goes there

Who's that creeping in my room
Blocking out the stars and moon
I fear you will attack me soon
Who goes there

Blind rage
Blind rage

Blind rage
Blind rage
I'm in a blind rage

Blind rage
You're making me scared
Blind rage
Make me scared
Blind rage

Blind rage
Blind rage
Blind rage

Blind rage
Blind rage

The Tell-Tale Heart Pt. 2

Furious
It made me furious
A dull quick sound pounding
Like a watch encased in cotton
Tick tock
I knew that sound well
It increased my fury
The beating of the old man's heart
I scarcely breathed and refrained
Motionless
The tattoo of the heart
Hellish
Increased and was extreme
It grew louder
Louder

I am nervous at this dead hour of the night
Amid the dreadful silence of this old house
This sound excites me to uncontrollable wrath
I thought someone would hear this sound
I thought his heart would burst

His hour had come

Please open the door
Open the door

The old man has gone to the country
Gone to the country
But please search well
Please search well
These are his treasures
Treasures
Secure and undisturbed

Please sit and rest
You must be fatigued

Wild audacity
Perfect triumph

So they chat
Chat
Of familiar things
I hear ringing
Ringing
Do you not hear it

No

It is louder
It is making my head ache

Do you not hear it

No
No
No

I, I have a headache
The day is long
Do you not hear it

No

Do you fucking mock me
Do you mock me

They know
Do you think me
They know

An imbecile
Do you think me a fool
Villains dissemble no more

I admit the deed
Admit, Admit
Here, here
Admit

It is the beating
Of his most hideous heart

Burning Embers

Fly through the glass of a window pane
Fall through the sky feeling the rain
Walk on broken glass your tell-tale heart

Look through the bars of a dirty jail cell
Soar to heaven dive to hell
Listen to your tell-tale heart

Setting fires in the ghost twilight
We see you dress we bolt with fright
You see an apparition disappear

Jump to the table, jump up the stairs
Stand on the rooftop, looking out through the air
Walk on broken glass your tell-tale heart

Lenore, am I dreaming

How can death keep us apart, mmmm..
Lenore, I see you burning

And I'd walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Heart
Heart
Heart
Heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart
Your tell-tale heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers
Walk on burning embers your tell-tale heart

Imp Of The Perverse

Teacher:
Death by a visitation from God
Death by a visitation from God

Student:
I am shadow

Teacher:
Things material and spiritual

Student:
Maternal

Teacher:
Can be heavy

Student:
Suffocating

Teacher:
There are seven iron lamps
Which illumine our senses

Student:
Seven knives

Teacher:
Seven iron lamps to illumine our senses
And seven bells to celebrate the resurrection

Student:
Two marble balls in a sack
One long and slender candle
One mouth
Two reckonings
Consternation and treachery

Teacher:
Are you listening
Are you listening to me
Are you paying attention to me

Student:
I am shadow

Teacher:
Seven iron lamps
Seven oboes
Two small balls
And one tiny candle

Student:
Tiny candle

Teacher:
One pathetic flame
Embers dying

Student:
Dying

Teacher:
Five creatures from the monolith
Seven whispers from the catacombs
Five and seven numbing mumbling speeches
Are you listening

Student:
I am drawn to do what I should not

Teacher:
Guilty, guilty, guilty guilty
No, no, never never no
Seven mornings
Thirteen moons
Five wolves
One silk spread morning
Seven bells for seven senses
Each one lusting lusting

Student:
Guiltily

Teacher:
Two milk fed glands ripe and red tipped
Are you listening my little mouse
Each sense ripped from its bodice
Each gland primed to its overflow
Do you hear me my little mouse man
Do you hear me little cock

Student:
Semen

Teacher:
Are you listening
My little tumescence smear

Student:
Ligeia
I stand on the edge and am drawn to it
Guilt
I am shadow

Vanishing Act

It must be nice to disappear
To have a vanishing act
To always be looking forward
And never looking back

How nice it is to disappear
Float into a mist
With a young lady on your arm
Looking for a kiss

It might be nice to disappear
To have a vanishing act
To always be looking forward
Never look over your back

It must be nice to disappear
Float into a mist
With a young lady on your arm
Looking for a kiss

It must be nice to disappear
To have a vanishing act
To always be moving forward
And never looking back

How nice it is to disappear
Float into a mist
With a young lady on your arm
Looking for a kiss

Looking for a kiss
Float into a mist

The Cask

Edgar:
Never bet the devil your head
When I was an infant
My mother treated me like a tough steak
To her well regulated mind
Babies were the better for beatings
But she was left handed
And a child flogged left handed
Is better left unflogged
The world revolves from right to left
It will not do to whip a baby from left to right
If each blow in the right direction
Drives an evil propensity out
A blow in the opposite direction
Knocks it's quota of wickedness in

Hence my precocity in vice
My sensitivity to injuries
The thousands of injuries heaped upon me by Fortunato
And then finally his rabid insults for which I vowed revenge

I gave no utterance to threat
But the knowledge of "avengemenship"
Was so definite so precise
That no risk could befall me
By neither word
Nor deed had I given cause to doubt my good will
I would punish with impunity
I will fuck him up the ass and piss in his face
I will redress the wrong
But lips and psyche
Mind be silent
Fortunato approaches

Fortunato:
Don't take me to task
For loving a cask
The cask of Amontillado
Please don't make a pass
You can go kiss my ass
All I want is this mythical cask
The cask of Amontillado
I've heard so much through the grapevine
I've heard so much on the line
But the one thing that I lust after
Is the one thing i've never had
So is it too much to ask
Too have just one taste of the cask
Why you could go kiss my ass for the cask
Of Amontillado

Edgar old fellow
Dear bosom friend
Hail fellow well met
Oh great elucidator
Great epopee

Edgar:
Haha..
Fortunato what luck to meet you
What good good luck to meet
You and see you looking so splendid
I have received a cask of Amontillado
Or what passes
For Amontillado

Fortunato:
Amontillado
That most wondrous sherry
A cask
Impossible
How
So rare

Edgar:
I've had my doubts
I was silly enough to pay the full price
Without consulting you in the matter
But you were not to be found
And I was fearful of losing a bargain

Fortunato:
Fearfully stupid if you ask me Edgar

Edgar:
I am on my way to see Mr. Bolo

Fortunato:
A cask

Edgar:
A cask
To gather his opinion
Are you engaged

Fortunato:
Mr. Bolo cannot tell Amontillado from goat's milk

Edgar:
Yet some say his taste is a match for your own

Fortunato:
Hardly, dear boy
Let us go

Edgar:
Where

Fortunato:
To your vaults to the supposed Amontillado

Edgar:

Oh my good friend no
I could not impose upon your good nature
You have, after all, an engagement

Fortunato:
To hell with the engagement
I have no engagement
Before the sky withers and falls let us go

Edgar:
But the vaults are damp
And I see you are afflicted with a severe cold

Fortunato:
Oh let us go
The cold is nothing
You've been taken advantage of
And Mr. Bolo cannot tell Amontillado from piss
The cask

Edgar:
It is farther on
But see the white web work
Which gleams from these cavern walls

Fortunato:
Nitre
Nitre

Edgar:
How long have you had that cough
Yes, nitre

Fortunato:
It is nothing

Edgar:
We should go back
Your health is precious
You are a man who would be missed

Fortunato:
[coughing]

Edgar:
Let's return
I cannot be responsible for causing you ill health
And anyway there's always Mr. Bolo

Fortunato:
Oh be dumb i'll not be swayed
The cough is nothing
It will not kill me
I won't die of a cough

Edgar:
Of that you can be sure
Have some of this Medoc to warm the bones
And defend you from this infernal dampness
Drink
Drink damn you

Fortunato:
I drink to the buried that repose around us

Edgar:
And I to your long life
The nitre
It hangs like moss
We are below the river's bed
The moisture trickles, chills the bones
Let's go back
Your cough

Fortunato:
The cough is nothing
But .............
Let us proceed to the Amontillado

Edgar:
So proceed
Herein the Amontillado
Now Mr. Bolo

Fortunato:
Mr. Bolo is an imbecile
An ignoramus

Edgar:
Can you not feel the nitre
You really should go
I implore you
No
Then I must leave you here
But first
Let me render you all the little attentions within my power

Fortunato:
The Amontillado
Hahahaha..
A very good joke indeed, haha..
We will have many a rich laugh about it
Over our wine in the palazzo

Edgar:
The Amontillado

Fortunato:
Yes, yes yes
The Amontillado

Edgar:
Well
Then let's go

Fortunato:
For, for the love of God

Edgar:
Precisely
For the love of God
Fortunato
Fortunato

Guilty - spoken

Shadow 1:
Guilty

Shadow 2:
Guilty

Shadow 1:
I'm paralyzed with guilt
It runs through me like rain through silk
Guilty
My mind won't leave me alone
My teeth are rotted
My lips start to foam
Cause I'm so guilty

Shadow 2:
Guilty
Guilty

Shadow 1:
Oh guilty
What did I say
What did I do
Did I ever do it to you
Don't turn your back
I can't look you in the eye eye eye eye

Shadow 2:
Eye eye eye

Shadow 1:
I guess I am guilty as charged

Shadow 2:
Guilty, guilty, guilty
Guilty, guilty, guilty
Guilty, guilty, guilty

Shadow 1:
Don't do that

Shadow 2:
Don't do what

Shadow 1:
Don't do that
Oh you're such a child
Guilty
What can I do
I do it to you
But I do it to me too
Cut off my head
Hang me from the yardarm
Guilty
I'm paralyzed with guilt
I've got bad thoughts
I've got an evil clit

Shadow 2:
Guilty

Shadow 1:
My mind won't leave me alone
I've got a bad mind
I've got a bad bone

Shadow 2:
Guilty
Guilty as charged
Guilty

Shadow 1:
Don't do that

Shadow 2:
Don't do what

Shadow 1:
Don't do that
Oh you're such a reckless child
Do you remember when you were a baby
Do you have a jury

Shadow 2:
Yeah

Shadow 1:
Do you have a verdict

Shadow 2:
Guilty as charged
Guilty
Guilty
Guilty as charged

Shadow 1:
Do you have a verdict
Do you have a verdict
I'm guilty

Shadow 2:
You're guilty

Shadow 1:
Oh you're such a reckless child
I should beat you
I should hit you
I will put you in therapy

Shadow 2:
Guilty
Guilty
Guilty
Guilty

Shadow 1:
Hahahaha..

Guilty - song

( Alto sax: Ornette Coleman )

Guilty, guilty
Guilty, I'm paralyzed with guilt
It runs through me like a rain through silk
Guilty, my mind won't leave me alone
My teeth are rotted
My lips start to foam
Cause I'm so guilty
Guilty, guilty
Ooohhh guilty
What did I say
What did I say
What did I do
Did I ever do it to you
Don't turn your back, ah
I can't look you in the eye, ah
Eye eye eye eye
I guess I'm guilty as charged
I guess I'm guilty as charged
Guilty, huh, guilty ah, guilty ah, guilty
Guilty guilty guilty guilty guilty
Don't do that
Don't do that
Don't do what

Oh you're such a child
Real fool child
Guilty
What can I do
I do it to you
But I do it to me too

Cut off my head
Cut off my head
Cut off my head, ah
Hang me from the yardarm
Guilty, I'm paralyzed with guilt
I've got bad thoughts
I've got an evil clit

Guilty

Guilty, my mind won't leave me alone
I've got a bad mind
I've got a bad bone
Guilty guilty guilty as charged
Guilty
Don't do that
Don't do what
Don't do that
Oh you're such a reckless child
You remember when you were a baby
Do you remember when you were a baby
Do you have a jury, yeah
Do you have a verdict
Guilty as charged
Guilty guilty guilty as charged
Do you have a verdict
Do you have a verdict
I'm guilty
You're guilty
Oh you're such a reckless child
I should beat you
I should hit you
I'll put you in therapy, ah

A Wild Being From Birth

Rowena :
A wild being from birth
My spirit spurns control
Wondering the wide earth searching for my soul
While all the world is chiding
In visions of the dark night
I have had a waking dream
A holy dream
A holy dream
A waking dream of life and light
That cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding
With a ray turned back upon the past

While I aghast
Sit motionless through the misty night
Dimly peering at what once shone bright
Peeking wariy at what shone afar
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?

Poe :
In the consideration of the faculties
And impulses of the human soul
In consideration of our arrogance
Our radical, primitive, irreducible arrogance of reason
We have all overlooked the propensity
We saw no need for it
The paradoxical something which we may call perverseness
A mobile without motive
Through its promptings, we act without comprehensible object
Induction would have brought phrenology to admit this
We act for the reason we should not
For certain minds this is absolutely irresistible
The conviction of the wrong or impolicy of an action
Is often the unconquerable force
It is a primitive impulse
Elementary
The overwhelming tendency to do
Wrong for the wrong's sake
This impels us to its persecutions
Oh holy dream
We persist in acts
Because we feel that we should not persist in them
This is the combativeness of phrenology

Rowena :
We have a task before us which must be speedily performed
We know it will be ruinous to delay
Trumpet-tongued, the important crisis of our life calls
We glow

Poe :
We are consumed with eagerness to commence work
Yet a shadow flits across the brain
The impulse increases to a wish
The wish to a desire
The desire to uncontrollable longing
And the longing in defiance of all consequences is indulged
We put off all until tomorrow

Rowena :
We tremble with the violence of the conflict within us
The definite with the indefinite
The substance with the shadow
There is no answer except that we feel perverse
The shadow prevails
Our energy returns
We will commit now
We will labor now
Oh holiest of dreams
But it is too late
We stand upon the brink of the precipice

Poe :
We grow sick and dizzy
We go to shrink from danger but instead we approach it
We are intoxicated by the mere idea
Of a fall from such a great height
This fall, this rushing annihilation
For the very reason
It contains the most loathsome and ghastly images
Of death and suffering
For this reason do we now most impetuously desire it
There is no passion in nature
So demonic as the passion of him who
Shuddering upon the edge, meditates a plunge
We will these actions merely
Because we feel that we should not
Having realized this, I swoon
It is the spirit of the perverse
The idea of a poison candle struck my fancy
And I procured one for my victim
I will not vex you with impertinent details
But suffice it to say the verdict was
"Death by the visitation of God"

Rowena :
All went well for me

Poe :
All went well for me

Rowena :
His estate inherited
I reveled in absolute security
I would never be found out
I was safe
I was safe
If I did not prove fool enough to make open confession

Poe :
If I did not prove fool enough to make public confession
No sooner had I uttered those words
Than I felt an icy chill creep into my heart
I made a strong effort
To shake off this nightmare of the soul
I laughed
I whistled
I walked and then walked faster
I thought I saw a formless shape approaching me from behind
And then I ran
I pushed and shoved blindly
I thought I left a hand upon my throat
No mortal hand
I screamed
And then clearly, clearly
I enunciated pregnant sentences
That consigned me to the hangman and the hell
The fullest judicial conviction
Today I wear chains but tomorrow I shall be fetterless
But where?
Oh holy dream
Oh beam of light
I fall prostrate with excitement this holy night

*** Thanx a lot to Dave Tucker for this one ***

I Wanna Know (The Pit And The Pendulum)

( With The Blind Boys Of Alabama )

Under the intense scrutiny of Ligeia's eyes
I have felt the full knowledge
And force of their expression
And yet been unable to possess it
And have felt it leave me
As so many other things have left
The letter half-read
The bottle half-drunk
Finding
Finding in the commonest objects of the universe
A circle of analogies
Of metaphors
Ooohhh
For that expression
Which has been willfully
Withheld from me
The access to the inner soul denied

I wanna know, ooohhh
I wanna know
I wanna know, oh
I wanna know

In consideration
In consideration of the faculties and impulses
Of the human soul
Of the human soul
In consideration
Of our arrogance
Of our arrogance
Our radical, primitive irreducible arrogance of reason
We have all overlooked the propensity
We saw no need for it
The paradoxical something which we may call perverseness
Perverseness
Through its promptings we act without
Comprehensible object
We act for the reason we should not
We act for the reason we should not
For certain minds this is absolutely irre-, irre-
Irresistible
Irresistible
The conviction of the wrong
Or impolicy of an action
Is often the unconquerable force
The unconquerable force
It is a primitive impulse
It is a primitive impulse
Primitive impulse
The overwhelming tendency
The overwhelming tendency to do
Wrong for the wrong's sake
To do wrong for the wrong's sake
We persist in acts
Because we feel that we
Should not persist in them
Because we feel we, feel we
Should not persist, per-, persist in them, ah
Ooohhh

So I wanna know
I wanna know
I wanna know
I wanna know

I wanna, I wanna know
I wanna, I
Ooohhh, we persist in action
We persist in action
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong
Ooohhh
Wrong, wrong
Oh we persist in action
Ah yeah yeah
When you know that it's wrong

Science Of The Mind

In the science of the mind
There is no forgiving
Paralyzed I lay here sleeping
Quiet as a little child

Heart starts beating, blood rushing pounding
Moving quiet as a little lamb
In the science of the mind
Limbs are bound devoid of movement

The injuries we do in kind
Are visited upon us often
In the science of the mind
Trying hard to move a shadow

Don't bury me I'm still alive
The science of the mind unyielding
The science of the mind unyielding
The science of the mind unyielding

Annabel Lee/The Bells

Annabel Lee :

Let the burial rite begin
The funeral song be sung
An anthem for the queenliest dead
That ever died so young

Sweet Lenore has gone before
Taking hope that flew beside
Leaving instead the wild dead child
That should have been your bride

It was many and many a year ago
In a kingdom by the sea
She was a child and you were a child
In the kingdom by the sea

But the moon never beams
The stars never rise
No angels envy thee
For Ligeia rests dead
With three winged seraphs
In this kingdom by the sea

Wedded darkly
Soul to soul
You shrink in size
Down to a mole
And disappear into the hole
Of the dark mind's imaginings

Shrinking
Shrinking
Shrinking

Hop Frog

( Sung by David Bowie )

Well they call me a juicy hop-frog
You can see me in any wood bog
Don't you know that they call me the hop-frog
Hopping frog

I'm a hop-frog
A hop-frog
They call me the hop-frog
Hop, hop-frog

They call me the hop-frog
See me in any wood bog
Don't you know that call me a hop-frog
Hop-frog

They call me the hop-frog
See me in a wood bog
They're calling me a hop-frog
Hop-frog

You can see me in a ballroom
You can see me in a bedroom
You can see me in the woods
Hop, hop-frog

They call me the hop-frog
They call you the hop-frog
Well they call you the hop-frog
Hop, hop-frog

Frog

Every Frog Has His Day

King:
Oh mellifluous dwarf
Prince of all the jesters
Funny little thing you are
Make me laugh
As God's voluminous star

Hop Frog:
Gracious majesty
Today is not made for laughter day
This moment sacred is more for royal sunsets
Then comic ruin or suicidal jests

King:
I'll be the judge of that thank you
Make me laugh le petite cur
Drink some wine
Lest you foul sweet time

Hop Frog:
Drink upsets me
Please your liege
This would mark the death me

King:
I said drink you scabrous whore
Are you deaf as well as short?

Tripitena:
Kingdom's Sire
Big as you are
Save such
Bile for larger foes

King:
Make me laugh
'Fore I stretch your neck like a giraffe

Tripitena's Speech

Tripitena:

My love
The king by any other name a pissoir
You, my love tower over them all
They are but vermin beneath your heels
They are monkeys
Suit them, frame them to your own vision
But do not let one false word
Of mockery seep through to your vast heart
I have seen you from close and afar and your worth
Far exceeds your height, your width
The depth of your sorrow
Oh willful outcast doth thou not see the light of our love
Our linked fortunes
Our hearts melded together
Into one fine golden braided finery
They listen to the music of idiots and amuse themselves
With the sordid Miseries of their businesses
They are not the things of angels
Nor of any higher outpost that humanity might aspire to
Your loathsome vomitous
Businessman king is of the lowest order
His advisors
Crumbling mockeries of education driven by avarice
My love
Dress them in the suits of mockery
And in their advanced state of stupidity
And senility
Burn and destroy them so their ashes might join the compost
Which they so much deserve
If justice on this earth be fleeting
Let us for once hear the weeping
And the braying of the businessman king
Let them be the the orangutans they are
And set them blazing from the chandelier for all to see
Hanging from the ceiling by their ridiculous chains
And petticoats which you will have them wear
Under the guise of costumic buffoonery
He who underestimates
In time is bound to find the truth sublime
And hollow lie upon the grates of systemic disorder
Businessmen
You're not worth shitting on

Who Am I? (Tripitena's Song)

Sometimes I wonder who am I
The world seeming to pass me by
A younger man now getting old
I have to wonder what the rest of life will hold

I hold a mirror to my face
There are some lines that I could trace
To memories of loving you
The passion that breaks reason in two

I have to think and stop me now
If reminisces make you frown
One thinks of what one hoped to be
And then faces reality

Sometimes I wonder who am I
Who made the trees, who made the sky
Who made the storms, who made heartbreak
I wonder how much life I can take

I know I like to dream a lot
And think of other worlds that are not
I hate that I need air to breathe
I'd like to leave this body and be free

I'd like to float like a mystic child
I'd like to kiss an angel on the brow
I'd love to solve the mysteries of life
By cutting someone's throat or removing their heart

You'd like to see it beat
You'd like to hold your eyes
And though you know I'm dead
You'd like to hold my thighs

If it's wrong to think on this
To hold the dead past in your fist
Why were we given memories
Let us lose our minds and be set free

Some-, sometimes I, I wonder who am I
The world seeming to pass me by
A younger man now getting old
I have to wonder what the rest of life will hold

I wonder
I wonder -

- Ooohhh, who started all this
Was God in love and gave a kiss
To someone who later betrayed
And Godless love sent us away

To someone who later betrayed
And Godless love sent us away

Courtly Orangutans

Hop Frog:
Tomorrow is the seasonal ball
I propose costumes for you
And the honourable ministers to wear

King:
Yes

Hop Frog:
All dress as orangutans
All your guests will run and scream
With their mouths agape
And try to hide
And you Sire will have last laugh
For such imperial cunning

Hop Frog:
I will reach, restore wrong
I will torture you
I will burn you
Dead

Tripitena:
My prince
My prince
You light a fire .......
Burn, monkeys
Burn

Guardian Angel

I have a guardian angel
Keep him in my head
When I'm afraid and alone
I call him to my bed
I have a guardian angel
Who keeps bad things from me
The only way to ruin it would be for me
Not to trust me
The only way to ruin it would be for me
Not to trust me

I have a guardian angel
Who's often saved my life
Through malevolent storms and crystal drums
The angel on my right
Has lifted me up and set me down
Always showing me what's right
And if my instinct proved me wrong
The angel set it right
And if my instinct proved me wrong
The angel set it right

Have a guardian angel
I keep him in my head
And when I'm having nightmares
He shows me dreams instead
I have a ring, I have a dress
I have an empty shell
By the books below tea cups
I've kept a kind of hell
By the books below tea cups
I've kept a kind of hell

Panic and anxiety
So often in my head
But I had a guardian angel
Who took care of me instead
The champagne cork the nightlight owl
A raven and a duck
The seed of pining parents
And your despairing love
The seed of pining parents
And your despairing love

Love and luck both have charmed lives
Can change all things about
I had a guardian angel
That's what this is all about
I have a guardian angel
I keep him in my head
When I'm alone and become afraid
He saved my life instead
When I'm alone and become afraid
He saved my life instead

Guardian angel
Guardian angel
Guardian angel
Guardian angel
Guardian angel

Lulu

Brandenburg Gate

I would cut my legs and tits off
When I think of Boris Karloff and Kinski
In the dark of the moon

It made me dream of Nosferatu
Trapped on the isle of Doctor Moreau
Oh wouldn’t it be lovely

I was thinking Peter Lorre
When things got pretty gory as I
Crossed to the Brandenburg Gate

I was feeling snappy perhaps I’d been napping
And I’d just ate
A following heart can tear you apart
On a midnight to 8 shift

A graveyard romance can only give one chance
As the tombstones weave and breathe

Feeling happy when my heart got beating
On a Sunday afternoon

I dreamt of breezes going through the treeses
And stars were still illumed
I have three hearts that I keep apart
Trying to relate
To normal feelings and the nightime reelings
And some absynthe drunk so late

The cook got drunk and all the whores they shrunk
Onto the size of dessert plates
But me I’m happy cause I got my little nappy
And some opium to set me straight
I’m just a small town girl who wants to give it a whirl
While my looks still hold me straight

Straight up to illusion and fantasy’s fusion
Of reality mixed with drink
I’m just a small town girl who’s gonna give life a whirl
Looking at the Brandenburg Gate

The View

I am a chorus of the voices
That gather up the magnets
Set before me

I attract you and repel you
A science of the heart
And blood and meaning

The coldness of most beauties
Is a challenge that our youth
Must quickly conquer

There is no time for guilt
Or second guessing, second guessing
Based on feeling

I am the truth, the beauty
That causes you to cross
Your sacred boundaries

I have no morals
Some think me cheap
And someone who despises
The normalcy of heartbreak
The purity of love

But I worship the young
And just formed angel

Who sits upon the pin of lust
Everything else
Bores me

I want to see your suicide
I want to see you give it up
Your life of reason
I want you on the floor
And in a coffin your soul shaking
I want to have you doubting
Every meaning you’ve amassed
Like a fortune

Oh throw it away

For worship someone
Who actively despises you

For worship someone
Who actively despises you

I am the root
I am the progress
I’m the aggressor
I am the tablet
These ten stories

Worship
Worship

Pain and evil have their place
Sitting here beside me
I offer them to you as servants
Of the gold that you must give

Pain and evil have their place
Sitting here beside me
And I’ll offer them, I offer them to you
As servants of the gold
That you must give to me

I want to see your suicide
I want to see you give it up, give it up
Your your life of reason

I want to see you on the floor

And in a coffin, soul shaking
Soul shaking
I want to have you doubting
Every meaning you’ve amassed
Like a fortune, like a fortune
Throw it away

For worship of someone
Who actively despises you

Who actively despises you

Pumping Blood

If I pump out blood in the sunshine
Oil on the wheel
That is blasted and busted away

A nail or a little piece of glass
A little piece of glass
A little piece of glass
Swarming like bees over the air
Off the pump off the thing
The blood that I’m pumping away

Like bees over the air
Off the pump
Off the thing
The blood that I’m pumping away

Off the pump
Off the thing
The blood that I’m pumping away

If I pump blood in the sunshine
And you wear a leather box with azaleas
And I pump more blood
And it seeps through my skin
Will you adore the river
The stream, the trickle
The tributary of my heart

As I pump more blood
And it seeps through my skin

Will you adore the river
The stream, the trickle
The tributary of my heart

If I’m pumping blood
Like a common state worker
If I waggle my ass like a dark prostitute
Would you think less of me

And my coagulating heart

Waggle my ass like a dark prostitute
Coagulating heart
Pumping blood

Would you top me off
Would you top me off as I deepen a curtsy
While you yell out, “mercy”
We grow apart
Would you rip and cut me

Use a knife on me

Be shocked at the boldness
The coldness of this little heart
Tied up in leather
Would you take the measure
Of the blood that I pump
In the manic confusion of love

Supreme violation
Supreme violation
“Oh, ah, ah, ah Jack I beseech you”

“Oh Jack I beseech you”
Supreme violation

Blood in the foyer
The bathroom
The tea room
The kitchen, with her knives splayed

I will swallow your sharpest cutter
Like a colored man’s dick

Blood spurting from me
“Oh Jack, Jack I beseech…”
“Jack, I beseech you, I beseech…”
In the end it was an ordinary heart

“Oh Jack I beseech you”
As I scream out my pain
In the end it was an ordinary heart

In the end, in the end, in the end
It was an ordinary heart

“Jack, Jack, Jack, Jack, Jack I beseech you”
Supreme violation . . . Oh

“Jack, Jack, Jack I beseech you”
I call out your name

Blood in the foyer, the bathroom,
The tea room, the kitchen
And knives splayed
I swallow your sharpest cutter
Like a colored man’s dick
Blood spurting from me
Blood spurting from me

“Oh Jack”

“Oh Jack, I beseech ya”
In the end it was an ordinary heart

In the end it was an ordinary heart
Pumping blood

Mistress Dread

I’m built like you are
I have a dress and a train
Your snake cold lips
Make a harsh straight line
That echoes through my brain

You’re perfect
Let me lift a glass high
Let me follow in your footsteps
Let me follow in your sigh
Let me follow in your sigh

I’m a woman who likes men
But this is something else
I’ve never felt such stirrings
I feel like I
Was someone else

I wish you’d tie me up and beat me
Crush me like a kick
A bleeding strap across my back
Some blood that you could kiss

Oh kiss away, oh kiss away
I wish there was a strap of blood
That you could kiss away
I wish there was a strap of blood
That you could kiss away
Tie me with a scarf and jewels
Put a bloody gag to my teeth

I beg you to degrade me
Is there waste that I could eat
I am a secret lover
I am your little girl
Please spit into my mouth
I’m forever in your swirl

You’re heartless and I love that
You have no use of me

But I open the sticks, sticky legs I bear
And then insert a fist, an arm
Some lost appendage
Please open me I beg

You are my goliath
You are my goliath
And I am mistress dread

Oh I am mistress dread
Oh I am mistress dread

Open and release me
I love you in my head

Oh kiss away kiss away
Kiss away kiss away

All I ask my baby
Kiss away

All I ask my baby
Kiss away

Iced Honey

You can’t put a butterfly in a jar
If the effort’s too high no matter who you are
You can’t catch the moon, or the sun or the stars
It doesn’t matter who you are
Iced honey

Now me I’ve tried a million tricks
To make life cold and make it stick
Not running heat that flames then out
But the proud piece of ice that always floats
Iced honey

If I can’t trap a butterfly or a bee
If I can’t keep my heart where I want it to be
If no matter how much soul and heart
I put to the wood
If a flaming heart is not that good
Iced honey

If you can’t put a butterfly in a jar
If violence mars your final hour
If you make others feel like jam
Poured on a piece of charbroiled lamb

If it’s all mixed up and you cannot shout
And your oxygen starts to run out
If your final gasp has the recipe wrong
And instead of hello you say so long

If your energy starts to leak out
And people wonder what you’re all about
A heartbreaker with an unattached heart
The story of love gives them all a start

And me, I’ve always been this way
Not by choice, just this way
I can’t put my honey pot in a jar
Or a heart or a fist of some young boy

If you can’t put a butterfly in a jar
No wonder no need to wonder where you are
It might seem like hell, the River Styx
Your affection never sticks

No matter what you say, no matter what you do
A butterfly heart flies right past you
There’s nothing to say, nothing to do
See if the ice will melt for you
Iced honey

Cheat On Me

Why do you cheat on me
Why do I cheat on thee
Why do I cheat on me
Why do I cheat on me

I have a passionate heart
It can tear us apart
I have the loves of many men
But I don’t love any of them

Why do I cheat on me

You have your feelings
I have mine
I spit upon you and change my mind
I have many hearts to break
And many, many, many more to take

Let the light of stars pour out
Like a candle in a spout
Let the wick recede and break
Let the starlight radiate
Why do you cheat on me
Why do I cheat on me
Why do I cheat on thee
Why do I desecrate me
Why do I piss my dreams
That’s because that’s what it is

I have the drive
I got the scope
If I, if I, if I, could I give you a rope

Your love means zero to me
I’m a passionateless wave upon the sea
Passionateless wave upon the sea
Why, why, why
Do you cheat on me
Why, why, why
Do I cheat on thee
Oh why, do I cheat on me
Why do I cheat on myself
Well I got nobody else

I’m only young once
I want to taste it all and have fun
I have no real feelings in my soul
Where most have passion I got a hole
I really got nobody else

I want lovers like the rain
So many of them, so much the same
You say you love me, I know it’s true
But I, I, I don’t love you

Why do I cheat on me
Why do you cheat on me
Your love means zero to me
A passionateless wave
Your love means zero to me

Frustration

Frustration
In my lexicon of hate
I see you with your portraiture
Does he love you?
Does he love you too?

The brush strokes
Kiss your breasts and toes
I cry icicles in my stein
The heartbeats flutter
With an abnormal rhythm

The pain shoots through my body
A sword between my thighs
I wish that I could kill you
But I too love your eyes

You’re feeling less whore but you stimulate
The hatred smolders in your eyes
I’d drop to my knees in a second
To salivate in your thighs

But all I do is fall over
I don’t have the strength I once had
In you and your prickless lover
And his easel in his eyes

I feel the pain creep up my leg
Blood runs from my nose
I puke my guts out at your feet
You’re more man than I
To be dead to have no feeling
To be dry and spermless like a girl

I want so much to hurt you
I want so much to hurt you
I want so much to hurt you
Marry me
I want you as my wife

Spermless like a girl
More man than I
More man than I

Frustration
In my lexicon of hate
You’re feeling less like a whore but you
Stimulate

All I do is fall over
I don’t have the strength I once had
All I do is fall over
I don’t have the strength I once had

I want you so much to hurt you
I want so much to hurt you
I want so much to hurt you
I want you as a wife

Frustration is my lexicon of hate
Frustration is my lexicon of hate
Fru… fru… frustration, my lexicon of hate

I cry icicles
Heartbeats flutter
Abnormal rhythm

I wish that I could kill you
But I too love your eyes
I want you as my wife
I want you as my wife
Spermless like a girl

Lucky in feeling
More man than I
Marry me, marry me, marry me
I want you as a wife
Spermless like a girl
Puking my guts at your feet
More man than I
Fru… fru… fru… frustration
Frustration

Little Dog

Little dog who can’t get in
Moaning at the bed side
Moaning from each limb

Little dog who can’t get in
Can only cry but
Can not swim

Pony legs, little trot
Little dog has to wait a lot

The bigger dog has got his spot
And elbowed him away

Listen to him barking
Listen to him call
Little dog don’t have much at all

A puny body and a tiny dick
A little dog can make you sick

If you got the money you can go to the top
The female dog don’t care what you got
As long as you can raise that
Little doggie face to a cold hearted pussy
You could have a taste

A taste of what the big dog got
A taste of what the big dog got
The little dog with the one hundred dollar spot
Can run his tongue over the hot in trot
Hot in trot
Run his tongue over the hot in trot

Money can do anything
Money can do anything
Money can do anything
Tell me what you want

My small dog, he want what I got

Wants to run his tongue over my hot spot

Pathetic little dog

Pathetic little dog
The little man follows his nose
Counts his fingers and his toes
He still got those
Pathetic little dog
Pathetic little dog
Following his nose
But it needs my money to buy

I’m an up while you’re a down
I am an up while you’re a down
The spring and the will follow me around
While you sniff your shit in the wind
Sniff your shit in the wind
Money can do anything
Money can do anything
Tell me what it is you want
Just tell me what it is you want
I’m an up while you’re a down
The spring and the will follow me around

Tell me what it is you want
Tell me what it is you want

You sniff your shit in the wind
Follow me around

Pathetic little dog
Pathetic little dog
Pathetic little dog

Dragon

You don’t actually care
Love for you is no beginning
You’re not really there
Hallucination

I thought you were listening
Hallucination
I thought you were listening
Hallucination

I understand you think you’re above it
The adolescent sense of the sky
The feeling of billowing heartbeats
The fingertips run through your hair

They run through your hair
Hallucination
Hallucination

Oh you think you’re so special
That there’s no law meant for you
You come and go like the goddess you are
We’re mere mortals below
Fingertips run through your hair
We are mere mortals below

Are meant to be peons
Are meant to be servants
Are meant to be dismissible objects
One fucks with
One fucks with

Poor pitiful creature

The winner in heartbreak
The winner in caring
The winner in every miniscule method of wearing
Your heart on your sleeve
A red star of idiocy

An idiot’s idiocy
My, my caring for you
Caring for you
Do you think we’re a book
Some kind of a table
You can rest your feet on when you’re able
Red star of idiocy
An idiot’s idiocy
My caring for you
Poor pitiful creature

To notice the pining
The self deprivation
The self flagellation of you
Dear worshippers

We do like you regal
We do like you haughty
We do love to look upon your perfect body

The hair on your shoulders
The smell of your armpit
The taste of your vulva and everything on it
We all really love you
And you have no meaning
You don’t even see us
You were never caring

You go do what you do
You do it for you
No one exists with you
You’re way above caring
Leave a trail upon the wake
That no one ever tries to take
Because waiting for you
Thinking of you
Is another way of dying
Is another way of dying

I’m clawing your chest
‘Til your collarbone bleeds
Piercing your nipples ‘til I bite them off
I scratch your face and bite your shoulders
Way above caring
Way above caring
And your Kotex jukebox
Your Kotex jukebox

I’m doomed, I’m swearing
Waiting for you
In your high heels and nightie
Your leather dress squeaking
Latex now sweating, waiting for you
In your tincture
Your opium white bathrobe
Your white tiles run red now
Are we both dead now?

The liquid exchange of our heart
The liquid exchange of our heart
Are we both dead now?

You’re way above caring
Your heart on your sleeve
A red star of idiocy
An idiot’s idiocy
My caring
My caring for you
My caring for you
You’re way beyond caring
Your heart on your sleeve
A red star of idiocy
An idiot’s idiocy

My caring for you
Oblivious to caring
Oblivious to caring
Oblivious to caring
Leave a trail upon the wake
That no one ever tries to take
Because waiting for you
Because thinking of you
Is another way of dying

You’re way above caring
Oblivious to caring
Oblivious to caring
You poor pitiful creature
The mistake of feeling
The one who rejects you is the winner,
It’s true
The winner in heartbreak
The winner in caring
The winner in every miniscule method of wearing
Your heart on your sleeve
A red star of idiocy
An idiot’s idiocy
Your heart on your fuckin’ sleeve
My caring for you
We were meant to be peons
We’re meant to be peons
Mere mortals below
Meant to be servants

Meant to be dismissible objects one fucks with
Oh, oh, oh you’re so special
No law meant for you
You come and go like the goddess you are

The fingertips run through your hair
A billowing heart beats
Feeling
Feeling
What a glorious feeling
To be so rejected
So rejected

An idiot’s idiocy
My caring for you
You think I’m a book or a table
You can rest your fuckin’ feet on
When you’re able

The taste of your vulva, everything on it
The hair on your shoulders
The smell of your armpit
We do love you, to look upon your perfect body
We love you regal
We love you haughty
Oblivious to caring
Oblivious to caring
Caring

Oh my dear
Oh my dear
Oh my dear
Oblivious to caring

Are we really dead now
Are we both dead now

Junior Dad