mrry (Happy New Year)
 
Miscellaneous Lyrics Library - The Divine Comedy - Promenade 8/Jan/2002

Bath

Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream dies
At the op'ning day.

Rub-a-dub-dub
It's time for a scrub
So through clouds of steam
To a cracked and faded cream
Bath-tub wanders frail
Aphrodite, so pale
Pink and white
She is naked as sin
Wearing nothing but a grin
And a pin in her hair
Will she be drowned?
Found
With her hair tied behind
Shoulders back
And head inclined
To the sound of music
Playing above
Bathing her in love
But darkness and fear
Will disappear like the soap
When she opens her eyes.

She throws
Back her dormer windows
Morning light shows
Ophelia raised
From her watery grave
In a brave new world.

Going Downhill Fast

One butterfly
Spies
A glint in his eye
The birds sing
As he cycles by
Oh, why should he feel sad
This world ain't so bad
And besides
Woe betide he who would frown
When natural beauty abounds
And now, with wheels spinning free
He's picking up speed

Two butterflies
Tie knots in his stomach
They love it when he goes too fast
The wind whistles past
Vast
Oceans of air
That will mess up his hair
Though he no longer cares
Anymore for
Over-indulgence in vanities
Vacuous vice
Just once or twice
Thrice
Four times in five
We forget we're alive
And neglect to remind ourselves

Wait, wait for me
Oh great Mercury!
As late as you may be,
Will you wait for me?

Three butterflies
Realise
When it's time to depart
They have tickled his ribs
They have fluttered his heart
But the starting is easy
Compared to the stop
And the bottom is hard
When compared to the top

The Booklovers

"This book deals with epiphenomenalism,
which has to do with consciousness as a mere
accessory of physiological processes whose
presence or absence... makes no difference...
whatever are you doing?"

Aphra Benn: Hello
Cervantes: Donkey
Daniel Defoe: To christen the day!
Samuel Richardson: Hello
Henry Fielding: Tittle-tattle Tittle-tattle...
Lawrence Sterne: Hello
Mary Wolstencraft: Vindicated!
Jane Austen: Here I am!
Sir Walter Scott: We're all doomed!
Leo Tolstoy: Yes!
Honoré de Balzac: Oui...
Edgar Allen Poe: Aaaarrrggghhhh!
Charlotte Brontë: Hello...
Emily Brontë: Hello...
Anne Brontë: Hellooo..?
Nikolai Gogol: Vas chi
Gustav Flaubert: Oui
William Makepeace Thackeray: Call me 'William Makepeace Thackeray'
Nathaniel Hawthorne: The letter 'A'
Herman Melville: Ahoy there!
Charles Dickens: London is so beautiful this time of year...
Anthony Trollope: good-good-good-good evening!
Fyodor Dostoevsky: Here come the sleepers...
Mark Twain: I can't even spell 'Mississippi'!
George Eliot: George reads German
Emile Zola: J'accuse
Henry James: Howdy Miss Wharton!
Thomas Hardy: Ooo-arrr!
Joseph Conrad: I'm a bloody boring writer...
Katherine Mansfield: [cough cough]
Edith Wharton: Well hello, Mr James!
DH Lawrence: Never heard of it
EM Forster: Never heard of it!

Happy the man, and happy he alone
Who in all honesty can call today his own;
He who has life and strength enough to say
'Yesterday's dead and gone - I want to live today'

James Joyce: Hello there!
Virginia Woolf: I'm losing my mind!
Marcel Proust: Je me'en souviens plus
F Scott Fitzgerald: baa bababa baa
Ernest Hemingway: I forgot the....
Hermann Hesse: Oh es ist alle so häßlich
Evelyn Waugh: Whoooaarr!
William Faulkner: Tu connait William Faulkner?
Anaïs Nin: The strand of pearls
Ford Maddox Ford: Any colour, as long as it's black!
Jean-Paul Sartre: Let's go to the dome, Simone!
Simone de Beauvoir: C'est exact present
Albert Camus: The beach... the beach
Franz Kafka: WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!
Thomas Mann: Mam
Graham Greene: Call me 'pinky', lovely
Jack Kerouac: Me car's broken down...
William S Burroughs: Wowwww!

Happy the man, and happy he alone
Who in all honesty can call today his own;
He who has life and strength enough to say
'Yesterday's dead and gone - I want to live today'

Kingsley Amis: [cough]
Doris Lessing: I hate men!
Vladimir Nabokov: Hello, little girl...
William Golding: Achtung Busby!
JG Ballard: Instrument binnacle
Richard Brautigan: How are you doing?
Milan Kundera: I don't do interviews
Ivy Compton Burnett: Hello...
Paul Theroux: Have a nice day!
Günter Grass: I've found snails!
Gore Vidal: Oh, it makes me mad!
John Updike: Run rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run...
Kazuro Ishiguro: Ah so, old chap!
Malcolm Bradbury: stroke John Steinbeck, stroke JD Salinger
Iain Banks: Too orangey for crows!
AS Byatt: Nine tenths of the law, you know...
Martin Amis: [burp]
Brett Easton Ellis: Aaaaarrrggghhh!
Umberto Eco: I don't understand this either...
Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Mi casa es su casa
Roddy Doyle: ha ha ha!
Salman Rushdie: Names will live forever...

A Seafood Song

"Who'll have a fishy
On a little dishy?
Who will have a fishy
When the boat comes..."

And then he says
"With our glasses both raised in a toast
Let's sing for those in peril on the sea
Who cater ceaselessly
To thy every wish
With every fish
As fresh as fish can be
You see, I'm into my oysters
My king prawns and caviar
No matter how far away they are
I'll be there!"

And then she says,
"Now with our glasses both raised in this toast
Let's sing for those in peril on the sea
Who labour tirelessly
In their tiny boats
Off John O' Groats
Their socks soaked for me
You see, I do like my lobster
My hake, skate and rainbow trout
And if there's a fishy smell about
I'll be there! And then

And then we'll sing for those in peril on the sea...

Don't be frightened
Don't be scared
Chop off their heads
And little legs
Then peel away the shell
And open up your senses to the smell
The sound and colour
Touch and taste

Of crab, cod, clams and kippers
Scampi, squid, sole, shark and scallop
Winkles, whelks, whale and whiting
Seaweed, swordfish, sardines and sea urchin

Haddock, halibut, herrings and eel
Cockles, mussels, mackerel and veal
Pilchard, plankton, St Peter's fish and plaice
Octopussy jellyfishy
And dolphin's an aquired taste

"Who will have a fishy
On a little dishy?
I will have a fishy
When the boat comes in..."

Geronimo

While they have been eating
The rain has started falling,
Gradually gathering in strength;
What began a drizzle
Has now become torrential,
And doesn't look like coming to an end.

The two bedraggled figures
That huddle in the doorway,
With nothing vaguely waterproof to wear,
Are now secretly wishing
They'd listened to their mothers
When being told to always be prepared.

Screaming
'Geronimo!',
They run for it down the road;
With an arm around her waist
He leads her to a place
He knows.

Soaked through, but happy,
They squelch up to the landing;
The room before them
Makes a welcome sight.
The coal fire is throwing
Strange shapes upon the hearthrug,
And crying out to be knelt down beside.

She pulls off her jumper
And flings it in the corner;
He picks it up and hangs it on a chair.
She puts on a record
And sings into her coffee;
He puts a blanket round her,
Sits her down
And dries her beautiful hair.

Don't Look Down

"Birds and planes go
Through the rainbow
Every day though
You simply refuse
Old-fashioned Ferris Wheels
Are no big deal
They're just big wheels with chairs
So don't be scared
Just set yourself free"

She tells me it's alright
To open up my eyes
She holds onto my hand
And the clouds float by
The couple in the car below
They wave to us and say hello
I think they understand
The way we're feeling

I don't need to say 'I love you'
When we're floating
So far up above
Everyone else's lives
Are intertwined
With yours and mine
I hope
They find the joy
That we have found

She tells me it's alright
To open up my eyes
She holds onto my hand
And the clouds race by
The couple in the car above
I suppose they think
That we're in love
I think they might be right

And without warning when we're almost at the top
The wheel that turns us all comes to a sudden stop.
The wind that's blown us dies a quick and painless death
The air gets clammy and we hold each other's breath
We get the feeling that we're not alone in this
And then a God who really ought not to exist
Sticks out a great big hand
And grabs me by the wrist
And asks me "why?" and I say
"Well God, it's like this
It may be arrogance
Or just appalling taste
But I'd rather use my pain than let it all go to waste
On some old god who tells me what I want to hear
As if I cannot tell obedience from fear
I want to take my pleasures where and how I will,
Be they disgraceful or distasteful or distilled
And to be frank I find that life has more appeal
Without a driver who's asleep behind the wheel"

Then God decides that he has taken quite enough
Of all this atheistic tosh I'm spouting off
And so he calls upon his favourite angel choir
To sing of times when men were filled with Christian fire
But over-zealous angels flap their wings too fast
And cause the wind to blow and turn the wheel at last
And soon my feet are safely back on solid ground
And then I hear a voice say
"Don't look down!".

When The Lights Go Out All Over Europe

Twilight turns from amethyst
To deep and deeper blue
We've got an hour or two
Before it's time to go
Let's go see a movie show

Jeanne can't choose
Between the two
'Cos Jules is hip
And Jim is cool
And so they live together
With the trees and birds
And little girls
Who play upon
Poor Jean-Claude's nerves
Till finally
He strokes Claire's knee
And when she asks
Of his ambition
Jean-Pierre replies
"My mission
Is to become eternal
And to die..."

Heaven knows the reason why...

When the lights go out
All over Europe
I forget about old Hollywood,
'Cos Doris Day could never
Make me cheer up
Quite the way those French girls
Always could

Jean Seberg: Et puisque je suis mechante avec toi c'est la preuve que je ne suis pas amoureuse de toi
Jean Paul Belmondo: On dit qu'il n'y a pas d'amour heureux

Jean Seberg: Si je t'aimais... oh c'est trop complicé
Jean Paul Belmondo: Au contraire, il n'y a pas d'amour malheureux

Jean Seberg: Je veux que les gens s'occupant pas de moi et puis je suis independente... Peut etre que tu m'aimes?
Jean Paul Belmondo: C'est ce que lu crois, mais tu ne l'ai pas

Jean Seberg: C'est pour ca que je t'ai denonce
Jean Paul Belmondo: Je te suis superieur

Jean Seberg: Maintenant tu es force de partir
Jean Paul Belmondo: Tu es single, c'est lamentable comme raisonnment...

When the lights go out
All over Europe
I forget about old MGM
'Cos Paramount
Was never Universal
And Warners went out
Way back when
Those lights go out
All over Europe
I forget about old Hollywood,
'Cos Doris Day could never
Make me cheer up
Quite the way those French girls
Always could.

The Summerhouse

Do you remember
The way it used to be
June to September
In a cottage by the sea
Distant cousins, local kids
We climbed every tree together
And it never ever rained
Till we climbed back on the train
That would take us so far away
From the village and the bay
And the summerhouse
Where we found new games to play

Do you remember
Sunday lunch on the lawn
Daring escapes at midnight
And costumeless bathes at dawn.
You were only nine years old
And I was barely ten
It's kind of weird to be back here again

Do you remember
The summerhouse...?

Neptune's Daughter

When the last course has been consumed
They withdraw to the drawing room
Where the Schubert she plays with style
Keeps her friends happy for the while
But the memories are a burden,
So she draws back both the curtains
Stepping out into the night

As the glow from the house recedes
And their voices blend with the breeze
She is free to be who she will
Free to skip barefoot down the hill
Maybe she is Neptune's daughter
For she's drawn towards the water
Stepping out into the night

The water cold against her skin
Conceals a multitude of sins
And laughing like a little girl
She enters an enchanted world
Where seaweed girls with silver tails
Play games upon the backs of whales
They want her to come home with them
They grab her legs and drag her
Down again, down again
Into the sea he strides
And takes her in his arms
And he carries her back to shore

A Drinking Song

Back at the house
A bottle is found
And opened in honour
Of those who have drowned
While we who have not
Are stricken with guilt
And dutifully see
That not one drop is spilt
We're drinking to life
We're drinking to death
We're drinking 'til none of our
Livers are left
We're wending our way down
To the spirit store
We'll drink till we just
Can't drink anymore

Raise your glasses high
Drink the cellar dry

Well, bloody my nose
And blacken my eye
If it ain't some young Turk
In search of a fight
And chanticleer's chest
Is sagging with pride
For honour has yet
To be satisfied
Well, Heaven be thanked
We live in an age
When no man need bother
Except on the stage
With "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"
And definitely not tonight

I can still remember
When I was just a kid
I was free to do what I wanted to
But I never, ever did
So now with years of discretion reached
May we not forget
"Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité"
For there's life in the Old World yet!

There'll always be an England
An Ireland and a France
A Liechtenstein and Finland
And we have only one chance

Earnest young man with an unhealthy tan
Puts a drink in my hand and says
"I understand
You're in search of the place
To continue the chase
Of the heavenly taste
I suggest in that case
You all come with me
To my place by the sea
Where the glasses shall be
Overflowing with free
Alcoholic delights
And free love if you like
For what point has this life
If you can't realise
Your dreams?"

Oh, raise your glasses high
And drink the town dry

We'll drink beyond
The boundaries of sense
We'll drink 'til we start to see
Lovely pink elephants
Inside our heads
Inside our beds
Inside the threads
Of our pyjama legs
So don't shoot til you see
The reds of our eyes
And an army of elephants
Marching behind
From the day I was born
Till the night I will die
All my lovers will be pink
And elephantine

Ten Seconds To Midnight

Ten
Apes turn into men
And grapes turn into wine
How we made it to nine
I'll never know

Eight
Man looks for a mate
But fate plays cruel tricks
And seven turns to six
Still he's alone

Along comes number five
Eureka, I'm alive
I think, therefore, I am a lucky man

Three
From this balcony
The two of us can see
The house where we first met
One wet Sunday...

Tonight We Fly

Tonight we fly
Over the houses
The streets and the trees
Over the dogs down below
They'll bark at our shadows
As we float by on the breeze

Tonight we fly
Over the chimney tops
Skylights and slates -
Looking into all your lives
And wondering why
Happiness is so hard to find

Over the doctor
Over the soldier
Over the farmer
Over the poacher
Over the preacher
Over the gambler
Over the teacher
Over the rambler
Over the lawyer
Over the dancer
Over the voyeur
Over the builder
And the destroyer
Over the hills and far away

Tonight we fly
Over the mountains
The beach and the sea
Over the friends that we've known
And those that we now know
And those who we've yet to meet

And when we die
Oh, will we be
That disappointed
Or sad
If heaven doesn't exist
What will we have missed
This life is the best
We've ever had

 
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