1. |
Feral Smile
03:32
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wasted whisper through the trees
"why you following me?"
but you weren't there
and no one was
and my feet were bare
I walked along the snowy trails
came upon an earthen tomb
I crawled inside
I fell asleep
feral smile on my lips
as spring bloomed in my brain
we chase our dreams
until all that's left
is just blood and loose fur
and the worst stomach ache
you ever had
and at our lowest of lows
we heave up our hopes
in the dark
all alone
'til it's over
when I awoke
I found two dreams
lying next to me
one was you
the other was
the forbidden depths of the sea
and she whispered to me
"Your hopes and dreams
are merely drops in the gulf
of original sin
a true believer'd dive
headfirst in"
Archaic smile on her lips
as she turned into sand
I fear myself
I fear the truth
of my nature
'cause without fear
I might be a monster
please keep grooming my fur
and I'll lick all your wounds
fight the wilds next to you
'til it's over
'til it's over
I'll be true
'til it's over
I'm with you
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2. |
The Ink's Run Out
03:44
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A moonless sky
and a fool’s fire
the songs of spring
on the frozen strings of winter’s lyre
we gather to tell stories
with the will-o-wisp
trading recipes
for rattlesnake egg omelettes
with my band of desires
they try to write it down but
the ink’s run out
an old daydreamer
his fists full of sand
crawled by me
and my tribe
on the trail
I was pleased to see a familiar face
but it was ashen
and full of shame
I asked him what had happened
and without raising his head
he said:
"the ink’s run out"
further down our
darkening way
the woodland’s
arboreal band
began to play
from the sky and the trees
the blackbird bade, alongside woodpecker
turtledove and bluejay
the soothsayers crooned, they
sang doom’s swelling tune
"the ink’s run out"
on and on
our feet turned the pages
ink on my fingers
shoulda listened to the sages
as I crawled from my bed
with your face in my head
I scrambled for my favorite pen
I tried to scrawl it down
one simple word to lift my heart
but
the ink’s run out
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3. |
Big Sky and Morning Wind
04:34
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They ran through the dark
from their village ablaze
Big Sky carried the flame
Morning Wind carried what
little they'd saved:
some utopia seeds
for a happier day
Sky whispered a joke
but it clung to his beard
alongside the moonlight and snow
but Wind combed it free
stretched it effortlessly
over both of their shoulders
for warmth while they sleep
saying:
Every night
I will be here
right next to you
don't fear the abyss
just give me a kiss
under the moon
we'll make it through the night
They dreamed up the world
they'd build when they were safe
a rough sketch of a malnourished myth
a moat full of sap
for their pinecone keep
with snow gardens, snow orchards
snow valleys full of sheep
The drums of the beast
growled and snapped
at their feet
til they came to the river of life
across lay the sun
who could slay their abyss
but Big Sky don't swim
so he gave Wind a kiss
saying:
Every day
I will be here
waiting for you
you bring me the sun
make the world green
I will be blue
wide and true
I love you
and I know you know I do
I love you
and my love is as true
as the big sky is blue
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4. |
Bowers
05:17
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perched on the memory
of childhood’s tomb
of old-world love letters
carved in bedroom runes
a flawed translation of
your eyes in the dark
down the moonlit mountain
to the ramshackle heart
of this blurry old ark
I hold dear
perched on humanity
bray and babel us heathens
building a bric-a-brac model of
a ruined teenage eden
scrape the dirt from your hands
and head home with the sun
lovers kissed by lips like leather
from your purse
take the heather
start over building
our bowers again
relic by relic
we build the bower
in the canopied trees
of our mothers and fathers
a primitive memory
carries our wings
over paradises lost
to all the useless things
that we cannot bring with us
Perched on a second chance
it’s the last one standing, in a forest of ash
while a pilgrim sews tomorrow’s hopes
in the aftermath
in 50 years, the children build a tire swing
while the bowerbirds sing
a thousand more, the woods are blazing,
as fanatics burn their way toward the pilgrim’s true meaning
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5. |
Settlers
04:02
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We snuck in the back
your purse
full of the laws of nature
and kiss me over the garden gate
we stole the sandman’s silver watch,
fled down the trail of moonlight dripping from it’s cogs
I wrapped it round your wrist, it fit
and we hid within a starless kiss
You and I, we walk the streets at night
our faces painted for war
by dim street lights
the sun came up
our trail ran cold
because the hunting hounds
have all grown old
but who have we become
in the light of this new sun?
we lobotomized and then set free
the cult of Johnny Appleseed
and our rabid pantheon of dreams
can’t see the orchard for the apple trees
"there, there" and "it’s ok"
dance around your weeping face
like we danced around the fires
in our midnight masks
all we are is our desire
like ash is just the memory of fire
I cover you from head to toe
to hide you from all earthly woe
walk among scavengers
for just one more taste
of amazing grace
but to get out of the rain
we’ll settle for a fire and a fairy tale
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6. |
It's Ok
05:14
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In the dark I said
"Here are my desires
O monster of all monsters”
I put them before you
In a hope reserved for fools:
that you’d speak;
that you'd share
the same tongue
but you just laid by me in silence
midnight’s funereal band swirling around us
not from the songs that they played
nor from the fears with whom I layed
but something far away
bubbled up through our charade
and bayed
"it’s ok"
another night
when I wasn’t alone
Love’s pale face
smiled on me
I’d found home.
but I asked her
where she’d been
in the twilit interim
I asked her questions
till the words
made no sense
In truth
there’s nothing we can say
but it's ok
just place a kiss
upon the eyes
that at you dumbstruck stare
keep breathing life
into the timeworn love
all humans share
as you run one trembling hand
through locks of ancient midnight hair
and say
"It’s Ok"
an adult in the dark
is no braver than a child
both hold their own
dim candles to the wild
they may whisper different hymns
but there’s no difference in
the comfort they seek from them
I wanna be able to say
that it’s ok
if I spend my whole life
around fires
on my way
through your forest riches
my love
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7. |
Mermaid Stew
02:05
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you swing all mystery
as if it were a bat
a bat marred with the clay
god used on the fateful day
when he made man
but do you play ball?
no, I don’t think you do.
but I think that the cruel unfaithful boyfriend
you beat to death with it used to
I want to taste the pantheon
that burns within your diamond skin
all we know of you is what you’re not
a whisper from a shadow
You’re the Atlantic Yeti priestess of a UFO cult
but it’s just a shitty day job, you’re pure
novelty and wisdom incarnate
at night you ride penguin-back
under the stars
dive into the sea
where man throws all his misbegotten monsters
I want to swim in pas de deux
a heathen to your sinless blue
as the mouse-wheel of a world I knew
vanishes from view
I want to drown in search of you
I never want to find you
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8. |
Made of Midnight
04:17
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I stow my fetish for human bravery
in the rickety basket on my bike
it's so damn heavy
but I pedal steadily
on down the road
they said'll lead me home
it's paved in midnight
on top of midnight
will my road end
where it began
in a lemonade sunset
on cornfield sea
I'd ask the moon
but it's been muted
by a nocturnal halo
my cherubic blight
made of midnight
making love on a park bench
eros and medusa
moaning cthonic delights
while psyche watches, heart-broken in the bushes
and as I pass by them
I can hear her cry
they're all
made of midnight
when I get back
I'm climbing into bed with you
and kissing your lips until mine go numb
you'll become just an eyeball
and god in your smile
just out of sight
and made of midnight
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9. |
World Tree
05:02
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here they come
the songs of spring
lookin’ stupid
hand in hand with “I give up”
and “I love you”
their bags are filled up
bursting at the seams
with the sweetest melodies
in full bloom they hide the graves, softly erasing
all the dreams and the love and the lives it cost us
to sew them in the first place
it’s little consolation
to be sleeping in your leaves
if we’re unable to retain the memories
that would’ve helped us believe
the smell of fresh cut grass
squirming underneath my lamp
I ask “In 1996 were you with me
at summer camp?”
but it just turns back into sand
on a beach in Michigan
whispering “It’s ok”
that my childhood is fading
no longer scares me
what truly hurts
is that it no longer scares me
i’ve grown so numb to so much since then
in order to make it to “the end”
but what happens then?
20 years from now
can I still feel my lovers skin?
still love her like I love her now
remember why I loved her then
can I hear the blurry melody
that built this life for us
up in the world tree
that our dreams are not lies
is our holiest magic and
if we’re really fools to the end
then how can the end be so fucking tragic?
It killed me when I heard your mother say
on her death bed
"It’s all going too fast"
edelweiss never lasts
our bags are gonna burst
as our towers turn to flowers
the kingdom’s gonna crack
ripping up our life-long bowers
as the refuse of our lives
withers and fades like fresh cut grass
around the world tree
dance with me
around the world tree
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10. |
Handbag
06:35
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she pulls on a string
“shall we depart?”
red velvet lips sing
in the key of a child’s dream
her smile
like some ancient wordless drama
written for kings
lost children surround her
smiling and nodding
they listen as she speaks
glass chimes ring
in a foul wind
“the port-town called Homeward
has work for you all
it’s in the Candlelight Lands
where night never quite falls
its bridges stretch high
above the gull-mottled sea
where ships big as whales
can take you anywhere you wish to be
the streets are a labyrinth
no, you’ll never see it all
but there’s a shop on every corner
with something wondrous…
and novel to show”
with threads of twilight, romance and magic
she quietly sews their way
through the darkening woods
the kids blindly follow
In love with her wide and unblinking eyes
Like the light of the moon
Seen from the hopeless depths
of a violent sea
quicksilver drips
From her inhuman face
Like some Mad jack’s collection
Of baroque picture-frames
That the cannibal artist
Gave the puppeteer king
Who nurtured the features
Till he broke all his fingers
His lifelong ambition,
Was to make a real face
With conviction, wisdom, elegance,
With beauty and grace
the flame
of her wildlings’ allegiance
grows brighter each day
as the never-ending fable
takes them away
first Johnny grows fangs
and he bites Michael’s tail
who screams in black flames
its lucky Lucy’s grown scales
some children are winged,
others writhe in the dirt
all fur, spikes and horns
some have four eyes or more
no laughing or screaming
they just growl and roar
and their queen, she is singing
knocking an arrow
to her wild hawthorn bow
what’s underneath?
Some porcelain thing
sits broken, her puzzle
pieces hang loose
with wire and string
sneaking out from the cracks
in her red velvet lips
she sews while she sings
the wild heather sways in the breeze
that blows from the sea
it’s made out of leather
and by nightfall
it should be complete
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UUNO Japan
Ramshackle rock, with psychedelic subtleties and acoustic accoutrements.
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