Lyrics

Citizens

Every story I heardI’m glad I heard
The one about heaven
The one where you come home
The one in the eyes of the kind in this town
The one where the madman kept chasing ‘till he drowned
Something hides in the night of the great machine

But it’s a warm night that I see
You ask me to dance
So let’s
Let the streets carry
and the wind howl

I want no answer

Just to believe, If I can
To be lost
In the crowd
Something hides in the night of the great machine

But it’s a warm night that I see
(Death walks away in the eyes of a child,
Sirens sing to none).

August Bells

Your eyes have come
Like summer’s scream
To fill the streets
To make me wonder
To laugh in my face
To pull me under
To make all forget
Don’t leave just yet 

Before it all ends
Come walk with me
On the red red hill
On the red red hill

Tell me everything

You who speaks 

All the crying voices left for other shores
All the missing lines have gone not to return

Wait

God stays above, and this is what I tell you now
There ain’t no love and there ain’t no vow

Just a thin, white hand

You, who speaks but passes like the light
You, who looks but misses

Mimi

Mimi shake the dirt off your knees
Throw your hands again into the daffodils
Let you blow be thunder
Upon the enemy’s advance

Don’t worry about a thing
For that shadow will eat itself to dust
I swear it has nothing but its own cast
Mimi sing yourself a little tune

Keep your feet firm on the ground
Your blue gaze makes the world go around
For that shadow will eat itself to dust
I swear it has nothing but its own cast

Black Rose

(Words from a poem by Zbigniew Herbert)

It emerges black
From eyes blinded by lime
It touches the air
And stands like diamond

Amidst planetary chaos
Black rose, in a black rose what do you hide?
Lead out color from a black rose
Like a memory from a burnt city

Black rose, in a black rose what do you hide?

Door Ajar

Back to the water
What do you see?
Back to the water
Let yourself live

The pieces go
Back to a whole
It comes It comes It comes
I am still with you
I’ll always be

What do you belong to?
What do you see?
The pieces go
Back to a whole
It comes for you 

It comes

Passes the flame

A silent man wrote his name
The dearest gift of all
Letter by letter 

Another hand guided the trace of an angel in this world
Passing the flame passing time
Passes the flame passes time
Living together 

Not such a special thing
It’s only 27 years
Along the current the ferry sets sail
He teased and looked away
All smiled turned to the quay
Passing the flame passing time
Passes the flame passes time
It was high noon when the stranger spoke
To save her little soul
Never to be seen again and I am told 

The real him was 90 years old
Did you ever dream life would be this way
Reason lost and found again
The window embraced your embrace
Just a glimpse of a day
Lucy combed her hair
Passing the flame passing time
Passes the flame passes time
Pick an apple 

But maybe just one or two
The grenades she carries beneath they are for you
You who will lie under the hill
Just a child you too
Who will walk here when we are all through?
Passing the flame passing time
Passes the flame passes time
And all my women gather for a smoke or two
What’s the big deal now?
What else is new?

Balmaha

Dear, can I call you dear
When I see the land change in your eyes?
The color, the song, your kiss goodbye
It’s been a long year
Each day its own surprise

The city holds me, and I keep loving
Dear can i call you dear?
And it feels like all is about to be
And everything stands still

Dear, can I call you dear
Once again, the lake against the distant sky
The color, the song, your kiss goodbye

The sun rises where it rises

The sun rises where it rises
And sometimes so we rise
All lost things behind
The sun rises where it rises
It left an old trace
on your old pretty face
All things lost behind
Sometimes so we rise

[Clean]

Gates

Show your bare hands like a shade of steel
a quiet promise until
the circle lets in and we begin
hailing them to reveal

Come and play a game long gone

I know your eyes and the sight they bear
turning crimson the summer air
turning each song into a prayer
to this open door

Come and play a game long gone
each stroke given is a warm return
that burns all that is left to burn

Under a low and empty night
there ain’t no sorrow, not a cry
were we were our ruins rerise,
rest my brother.

Birds of a feather

They call the rising sun
that molten eye above
when the light upon their way is gone

The battle’s sway lingers and holds
a master counting her souls
but eyes are shut now to this ground
down in their await there ain’t no sound

Cover the cold and the wound
bury their names in the night
cover the cold and the wound
these arms will rest by your side

The flock will be like a thin line
upon the mountain standing bright
led and gone together
as birds of a feather

They call the rising sun.

Last man on Mount Elysian

Color the earth with the restless spin
that never ceases to be
the valley open, multiplies,
suspended, sunken sea.

Shadows here pass rumbling like Hades
once white horses, those endless wells

Waiting for you
is the one

This traitor who lives
the moon upon his face
counting the ashes like fallen leaves

Waiting for you
is the one,
and silence soon will come.

Below a fire

Lucy make me see through your eyes
speak as a wonderful child
Eve lead the way once again
all the hundred ways to today

For as long as I can see
For as long as I can go

In my escape, in my return

For as long as I can see
For as long as I can go.

Hour

Just a reflection with the eyes of truth
you are the fire that comes to see me
Out in the hours you stand so still
never a hand was held this strong

So near to break and nearer still
So close to shatter and growing clear

So near to rise and nearer still
So close to shatter and growing clear

Always here

Road

Blessed road
mine is the wish you command
and mine is the breath you demand
You I can’t escape or barrel too
please show me a home that’s a home

All my hundred lives i carry with me
tied up with a silver string
they crowd up and shout and toss about
they sing me down to sleep

And i’d like to rest far from your gaze
but i know you’ll come back always
till i bury my heart somewhere in the earth

And those who are my shining light
may i have them by my side

Damned road
you I can’t escape or barrel too
please show me a home that’s a home

Shemkel

When the storm ends in the last square
a last man stops
His heart knows the world all
He draws a face on the wall
so real, he can hear its longing

So he traces a bridge there
made of pillars and void
When two long shuffling wings
come embrace him from behind
Their shadow cast on the crossing

Shemkel

Jai Singh

Begin to turn your endless wheel
for fortune is with you now
the one who lives below all seasons

Leave your pyres of stars
oracles of a distant past

Climb down the stairs
solitude will always reach
to see yourself
now watch the ground beneath

For all that was
still flows and flows
deeper than before

Into the water
the only road
deeper than before

And we will be by your side.

Lovers’ eyes

Turn back so I can see
your face in a crowd of days
There, in your innocence
my wandering ends

Now speak so I can hear
the voices in your long wait
and I will be there
to meet their cold embrace

All the world lies behind
and begins within my lover’s eyes.

Under the lid

Under the tide
You walked on
eyes opened wide

Closed them where
dear voices ran
in the air

Oh child
your flag in the sunny plain
After the tide
Rests in me,
in mine.

Ester

Now the veil is long and white
enough to be stepped on
Dialogues crawled all over it
leaving their burnt smell

Ready now to be left
under closed windows
Under rain and seasons,
it will live again
in the mirror of your lips.

Yellow Flowers

Carry your pretty head
under the rail
Visions of heaven
angels’ trumpets await

The yellow flowers
I weave in eternity
I have waited on the same bench
So excuse me if I ask:

What thoughts did your hat
carry away,
under that moon
blown in full day?

I’ve held a thousand hands
I’ve kissed a thousand lies
My memory goes back to
that wish of the darkest sky

The yellow flowers
I weave in eternity
I have waited on the same bench
So excuse me if I ask:

What thoughts did your hat
carry away,
under that moon
blown in full day?

Charade

Dusk helped me see
A hand made me fall
Walls showed the way in
Your fire turned me cold.

All in a row the bitter end
All in a row as fast as I ran
All in a row the bitter end
All in a row

I can’t hold this heart
I can’t hold this floor
Every time I cease to play
it festoons changing light

In this game I hide,
Your turn comes with the tide.

Days end with dawn
My hope with a step
Silence is with the buzzing bees
while I turn my back

All in a row the bitter end
All in a row as fast as I ran
All in a row the bitter end
All in a row

In this game I hide,
Your turn comes with the tide.

Altars of rain

To leave you is to read you through the pages
to follow you through the cracks
To listen to you under my clothes
to sing to altars of rain.

To find you was breaking all mirrors
stomping on them, crying joyfully
To repent, offer you my bare bones and jelly,
to find you was a pretty sight to see.

Call out, call out
for all ghosts to remain
Call out for them
to sit at my table again.

To wait for you
is like a thunder in my ear
so small, that you can hardly see
I could bite it just like a berry
so red its heart is

And then, I can call out

Call out, call out
for all ghosts to remain
Call out for them
to sit at my table again.

Teethmaker

Teethmaker, in the dead of night
play the next one for me,
when you are almost a memory,
when I am not yours anymore.

Teethmaker, roll your cigarette
and raise your glass
as your ink slowly spills on the floor,
when I am not yours anymore.

Teethmaker, the trail was full of stars,
like never before
Raise your yellow eyes,
the needle will run its course.

Teethmaker, in the dead of night
play the next one for me.

I will marry you

I will marry you
when a word marries a mouth
And I will follow you
like a bird the road below

Love could be cruel
to such a good man

Look for the embrace
that will tie me to your bone
Believe in me
like I believe in you.

Love could be cruel
how could love be this cruel
to such a good man?

Aube

Liquid minute in the land of none
Faces seem to reappear
In a line guided by
the yellow trees
I don’t see but I can hear.

What a sight to behold.

L’Incantatore

Oh precious stone
of Paris town
give me your arm
give me your crown
All the sweetness
I’ve searched and found
I’ll burn for you
right to the ground.

For time lulling in your lap
for milk dripping in your joy
I will make a perfect clock
for all fruits to taste and bury
The meshes of the day
are waiting now

Come on come on come on

Oh precious stone
of Paris town
give me your arm
give me your crown

To all the folly
I’ve searched and found
I’ll give long wings
to leave this ground.

Auxilio

What will you say when it all comes
Where is the door
to the silent parade?

Through the street once again
songs of ashes
But to the embers you hum

Flower of skin
you walk through twin nights
I stagger to
What can’t be seen
will never be taken
and I will follow you.

Devotion

Nothing I want to know
of your forest of mirrors
Nothing I want to know
of your rain of arrows

I abandon the fluorescent vessel
where devotion resounded
like bellows in your hands

I wanna close the eyes
that heated up the sun
that warmed up our blades

My love the bells are ringing
their path to the sky
A useless truth
A useful lie.

Silver steps

Gentle silver steps
never said can I?
In the middle of this floor they move
with nowhere to hide
In this room they lived
in this room they died
they are the truth in your eyes
behind your shoulders man

You must say all inside out
You’d better run for your cover.

Holy

In the end there’s a ground
where the hour reappears
and it comes down
strong and holy
like the gold of long years

Is this really what I came for?
Is this really all for me?
All this yearning and hope
light reigns over now?

Gentle eyes, I remember
on the old shimmering road
A caraco left to burn slow
A river to carry us in.

Is this really what I came for?
Is this really all for me?
All this yearning and hope
light reigns over now?