Whose is the hand that I will hold? Whose is the face I will see? Whose is the name that I will call When I am called to meet thee?
In this life who did you love Beneath the drifting ashes? Beneath the sheeting banks of air That barrenly bore our rations?
When I could speak it was too late Didn't you hear me calling? Didn't you see my heart leap like A pup in the constant barley?
In this new life where did you crouch When the sky had set to boiling? Burnin' within; seen from without And your gut was a serpent coiling
And for the sake of that pit o' snakes For whom did you allay your shyness? And spend all your mercy and madness and grace In a day beneath the bending cypress?
It was not on principle Show, pro-heart, that you have got gall A miracle! I can bear a lot but not that pall I can bear a lot but not that pall Kingfisher, sound the alarm Say, "sweet little darlin', now, come to my arms Tell me all about the love you left on the farm"
He was a kind, unhurried man With a heavy lip and a steady hand But he loved me just like a little child, A little child loves a little lamb
Thrown to the ground by something down there Bitten by the bad air while the clouds tick Trying to read all the signs Preparing for when the bombs hit
Hung from the underbelly of the earth While the stars skid away below Gormless and brakeless, gravel-loose Falling silent as gavels in the snow
I lay back and spit in my chaw Wrapped in the long arm of the law Who has seen it all I can bear a lot but not that pall I can bear a lot but not that pall Kingfisher, cast your fly O lord, it happens without even tryin' When I sling a low look from my shuttering eye
Blows rain upon the one you loved And though you were only sparring There's blood on the eye, unlace the glove Say, honey, I am not sorry
Stand here and name the one you loved Beneath the drifting ashes And in naming, rise above time As it, flashing, passes
We came by the boatload And were immobilised Worshiping volcanoes Charting the loping skies
The tides of the earth left Us bound and calcified and made as Obstinate as obsidian Unmoving, save our eyes
Just mooning and blinking From faces marked with coal Ash cooling and shrinking Cracks loud as thunder rollin', I swear
I know you; you know me Where have we met before, tell me true? To whose authority Do you consign your soul?
I had a dream you came to me Sayin', you shall not do me harm anymore And with your knife you evicted my life From its little lighthouse on the seashore
And I saw that my blood had no bounds Spreading in a circle like an atom bomb Soaking and felling everything in it's path And welling in my heart like a birdbath
It is too short, the day we are born We commence with our dying Trying to serve with the heart of a child Kingfisher lie with the lion