Ian Anderson Album

This sparkling wine is all but empty.
Too late for trains and no taxis.
I know the feeling. seems all too contrived.
There was no master plan but the fact is:
You must stay with me and learn the secret language of birds.

A tentative dawn about to be breaking
On a rousseau garden with monkeys in hiding.
The truth of the matter, yet to be spoken
In words on which everything, everything's riding.
Now stay with me and learn the secret language of birds.

Circled by swallows
In a world for the weary.
Courted by warblers; wicked and eloquent trilling.

Lie in the stillness, window cracked open.
Extended moments, hours for the taking.
Careless hair on the pillow, a bold brushstroke.
Painted verse with a chorus in waiting.
Stay with me and learn the secret language of birds.

Down at the church the flower girl sits. legs innocent, apart.
I make the picture puzzle fit to start your heart.
Painted sister stopped beside. a word upon her saintly lip.
Perhaps admonishing the child inside the open slip.

I don't know where she might go when she runs home at night.
It's for the best: I wouldn't rest when I turned out the light.
No little flower girl singing in my troubled dream----
Just an old man's model in a pose from a magazine.

I have touched that face a dozen times before. and I have let my pencil run.
Laid down washes on a foreign shore, under a hot and foreign sun.
My best sable brushes drift the soft inside of her arm.

Her chin I tilt, her breasts I lift. I mean no harm.

I close the door. she is no more until the next appointed hour.
Northeastern light push back the night: painted promises in store.
No little flower girl singing in my troubled dream----
Just an old man's model in a pose from a magazine.

Down at the church my flower girl sits. legs innocent, apart.
I make the picture puzzle fit to start your heart.
My golden sable brushes drift the soft inside of her arm.
Her chin I tilt, her breasts I lift. I mean no harm.
I mean no harm. I mean

Fires on the mountain, and the dogs bark.
Crash of the ocean swelling: crickets in the dark.
The temperature is rising. the village gets no sleep.
It's hardly surprising, given the hot company they keep.

Somebody's home in the ash-fall margins;
Somebody's life in the lost and found.
Breaking news from the hotel vue pointe.
Sinking feeling, sink another beer down.

Hey, jimmy. what you doing here?
Looking up at the high cloud cover, so far and yet so near.

Flying in with the chopper. lieutenant of the crown.
Tell the boys from that cnn, the good cops have come to town.

Angry island, no-one's listening. shamrock villa, green to grey.
Down in the swamp, iguanas glistening.
Toast tomorrow, if not, today.

Hey, jimmy. what you doing here?
You a scientist? you a newsman? or simply come to feel the fear?
The temperature is rising. and we're in too deep.
There really is no point in disguising the hot company we keep.

My eyes are white circles above cheekbones on fire:
Pale hand gripping my pen.
Rounding up to the zero, adding infinite fractions,
Letting nine become ten.
Two pink doves strut the shingles
Picking crumbs from the breakfast I saved
For you dear. and I wish you were here
On this postcard day.

Focus on the fine indeterminate line
Where the sky meets the sea.
Desperate midweek words, banal and absurd
Freely flow out of me.
Well, I may be a hostage to summer
But I'm a hostage, not a slave.
And I'm clear that I wish you were here

On this postcard day.

Precious cargo of flotsam: mixed memories on an ocean tide
Swim madly with spice from the orient
On a mystery watery carpet ride.
But with the sun going down, the wind goes around;
Blows them back out of mind.

My eyes are white circles staring down past the point
Of my restless pen.
While the ghosts of my youth all sworn to the truth
Call my name again.
Two brown legs don't make a summer.
But two brown arms couldn't keep me away.
Well, my dear, I wish you were here
On this postcard day.

Crystal fountain springing from the hill.
It irrigates your soul. you may drink your fill.
Water of life, carried high.
One hand upon the gallon jar. feel her fix my eye.

Every good traveller's for the taking.
All good money for the making.

Seller's market: wet appeal.
Water carrier------let's make the deal.

Covered face and black pool eyes.
Between us, no words spoken: no words to the wise.
Here's to another time and a drink somewhere.
Plush on a nain carpet; on a café chair.

Hard black crows bobbing where once ran deep furrows.
Frazzled oak silhouetted in her ivy dress.
Winter sun catches dog fox through thin hedges:
Throws his long shadow north to the emptiness.

Farmhouse in tatters; shuttered and battered.
Even lovers don't go there these last few years.
Spider-web windows on set-aside heroes
Standing lost in a landscape of tears.

I see you better now, shaded in deeper blue.
Hardly needing to carry the find-your-way lamp
Down to the river.
Tonight flies a better moon.

Sad water buffalo lie fast near the shallows;
A splash revealing the fly-catching fishes.
Dark gods silently watching.
Tonight flies a better moon.

I guess you've known lovers here, compliant in passion;
Softly laid in the old reed bed, harshly
Lit in the noon sun.
Tonight flies a better moon.

Now cloaked in this milky light, new as the virgin dawn,
Shrouded sweetly in all kinds of mystery,
You turn, smile and then are gone.
Tonight flies a better moon.

Dear uncle sold her into the purest kind of slavery.
Hood-eyed little middlemen profited from damaged goods
Along the way.
Good angels brought her back to a last nepal summer.
Debased, hollow-faced, a smile might become her.
Now she's cosied up, cosied up and comforted
In the warm flush of september.
Gone before winter.
Wondering as to might-have-beens.
Somebody's daughter in sanctuary, waiting.

Seen through softer cage of kindness, far and further still away,
From time-warp victorian zoos
Where staring ice cream gameboys play.
Big paws, worn claws and swishing tails.
More damaged goods in the market sales.
Too proud for anger, too late for hate: resigned in dignity.
Gone before winter.
Purring might-have-beens.
Somebody's kitten in sanctuary, waiting.

Somebody near you in sanctuary, waiting.

In all my lives, I never knew anyone like you before.
Woke up one day, swore I heard the sound of heaven knocking on my door.
And after all these years long passing,
Time to reflect, no time for wasting.
Walking down the jasmine corridor.

Reflecting echoes of quiet laughter.

In all my life, I was never better served than I was served by you.
And in my way, hope you agree I tried to serve you too.

Out on the headland I stepped once unsteady.
You there to catch me , I breathe more freely.
Hand in mine down the jasmine corridor.

Through all my life, I chased flitting illusions at a faster pace.
Never stopped to think: the moment was for seizing, had myself to face.
You made my bed to lie in, stately.
Mad cats, grandchildren, here more often lately.
The final view from the jasmine corridor.

Cool in the corner, tom cat sitting
on the edge of the yard; sand-flies flitting.
Orange order on a field of green.
Smothers me to smithereens.
Rum and cola, ice cubes crashing.
Jumping beans and brown eyes flashing.
Long hair swinging, tell me how d'you feel?
Well, hot and fancy, it's the habanero reel.

Troubled skin? Pour oil upon it.
She's fit to burn in her new Scotch Bonnet.
Spice up anybody's stew.
Frogs and goats and chickens too.

Barefoot in the sunshine.
Kicking empty beer cans down on the high tide line.
Big wave nearly float your dress away.
And I'm thinking that it's just another day:
just another day.

Feel that hot rush start its tickle.
Sweat is rising, taste buds prickle
with ears of bat and eye of eagle.
It's just as well it's strictly legal.

Night close in on a shanty town.
Panama freighter wearing rusty brown.
She sails tomorrow and she's homeward bound.
Head up on a lumpy sea.

I'm not the only lonely planet rider
In this one horse town, I'm thinking.
And I won't over-rate or patronize you.

I know we're as different as chalk and cheese;
As black hole winters and salad days
And I wouldn't like your mother much anyway.

But it's not her I'm taking home with me.

Don't intend to dress you in silver threads
Like some trophy in sublime seclusion.
Won't try to educate or civilize you.

Night close in on a shanty town.
Panama freighter wearing rusty brown.
She sails tomorrow and she's homeward bound
And you're bound to come home with me.
On the panama freighter with me.

No buzz words, fuzzy fudge words,
so freeze those goalposts, don't take the Admiral on board.
This Hardy's not for kissing…
Expression, no explosion,
or whispered promises in cliché or in rhyme.
Instead let's talk the secret language of birds.

Right time but the wrong idea.
Well, you're making it all sound just the same.
Try taking it up a key like that Nightingale
still over there in Berkeley Square.

Do we have problems of communication?
There's something I don't know and you can't explain it to me.
Let's talk the secret language of birds.

Step out of the circus now.
Learn a new trick and make it stick.
Try taking it up a key like that Nightingale
still over there in Berkeley Square.

Finger tracing on misty window:
I'm reading loud and clear this salacious semaphore,
as you leave me standing at the station.
Give it to me ---- the big dawn chorus:
no whispered promises in cliché or in rhyme.
Let's talk the secret language of birds.

Right time but the wrong idea.
Well, you're making it all sound just the same.
Try taking it up a key like that Nightingale
still over there in Berkeley Square.

[No lyrics]

Pick up my wings and fly
Into a constable sky.
Look down on the world and try
To make you out on the distant ground.
Lonely toy in a lost toy-town.
Suspended in spiral sounds---
Sounds of circular breathing.

I'm a kite on a silver thread.
Daring lightning to strike me dead.

Harsh echoes of things you said
Banished me to a thinner space
With unholy ghosts of your bedroom face.
Hands cupped to my ears to place
The sound of circular breathing.

Matchbox cityscape below----
I watch lowry matchstick figures go.
Caught in the timeless flow of discreet silence.

[No lyrics]

(Spoken)

[No lyrics]

Really don't mind if you sit this one out.

My words but a whisper -- your deafness a SHOUT.
I may make you feel but I can't make you think.
Your sperm's in the gutter -- your love's in the sink.
So you ride yourselves over the fields and
you make all your animal deals and
your wise men don't know how it feels to be thick as a brick.
And the sand-castle virtues are all swept away in
the tidal destruction
the moral melee.
The elastic retreat rings the close of play
as the last wave uncovers the newfangled way.
But your new shoes are worn at the heels and
your suntan does rapidly peel and
your wise men don't know how it feels to be thick as a brick.

And the love that I feel is so far away:
I'm a bad dream that I just had today -- and you
shake your head and
say it's a shame.

Spin me back down the years and the days of my youth.
Draw the lace and black curtains and shut out the whole truth.
Spin me down the long ages: let them sing the song.

See there! A son is born -- and we pronounce him fit to fight.
There are black-heads on his shoulders, and he pees himself in the night.
We'll
make a man of him
put him to trade
teach him
to play Monopoly and
to sing in the rain.

The Poet and the painter casting shadows on the water --
as the sun plays on the infantry returning from the sea.
The do-er and the thinker: no allowance for the other --
as the failing light illuminates the mercenary's creed.
The home fire burning: the kettle almost boiling --
but the master of the house is far away.
The horses stamping -- their warm breath clouding
in the sharp and frosty morning of the day.
And the poet lifts his pen while the soldier sheaths his sword.

And the youngest of the family is moving with authority.
Building castles by the sea, he dares the tardy tide to wash them all aside.

The cattle quietly grazing at the grass down by the river
where the swelling mountain water moves onward to the sea:
the builder of the castles renews the age-old purpose
and contemplates the milking girl whose offer is his need.
The young men of the household have
all gone into service and
are not to be expected for a year.
The innocent young master -- thoughts moving ever faster --
has formed the plan to change the man he seems.
And the poet sheaths his pen while the soldier lifts his sword.

And the oldest of the family is moving with authority.
Coming from across the sea, he challenges the son who puts him to the run.

What do you do when
the old man's gone -- do you want to be him? And
your real self sings the song.
Do you want to free him?
No one to help you get up steam --
and the whirlpool turns you 'way off-beam.

LATER.
I've come down from the upper class to mend your rotten ways.
My father was a man-of-power whom everyone obeyed.
So come on all you criminals!
I've got to put you straight just like I did with my old man --
twenty years too late.
Your bread and water's going cold.
Your hair is too short and neat.
I'll judge you all and make damn sure that no-one judges me.

You curl your toes in fun as you smile at everyone -- you meet the stares.
You're unaware that your doings aren't done.
And you laugh most ruthlessly as you tell us what not to be.
But how are we supposed to see where we should run?
I see you shuffle in the courtroom with
your rings upon your fingers and
your downy little sidies and
your silver-buckle shoes.
Playing at the hard case, you follow the example of the comic-paper idol
who lets you bend the rules.

So!
Come on ye childhood heroes!
Won't you rise up from the pages of your comic-books
your super crooks
and show us all the way.
Well! Make your will and testament. Won't you?
Join your local government.
We'll have Superman for president
let Robin save the day.

You put your bet on number one and it comes up every time.
The other kids have all backed down and they put you first in line.
And so you finally ask yourself just how big you are --
and take your place in a wiser world of bigger motor cars.
And you wonder who to call on.

So! Where the hell was Biggles when you needed him last Saturday?
And where were all the sportsmen who always pulled you though?
They're all resting down in Cornwall --
writing up their memoirs for a paper-back edition
of the Boy Scout Manual.

LATER.
See there! A man born -- and we pronounce him fit for peace.
There's a load lifted from his shoulders with the discovery of his disease.
We'll
take the child from him
put it to the test
teach it
to be a wise man
how to fool the rest.

QUOTE
We will be geared to the average rather than the exceptional
God is an overwhelming responsibility
we walked through the maternity ward and saw 218 babies wearing nylons
cats are on the upgrade
upgrade? Hipgrave. Oh, Mac.

LATER
In the clear white circles of morning wonder,
I take my place with the lord of the hills.
And the blue-eyed soldiers stand slightly discoloured (in neat little rows)
sporting canvas frills.
With their jock-straps pinching, they slouch to attention,
while queueing for sarnies at the office canteen.
Saying -- how's your granny and
good old Ernie: he coughed up a tenner on a premium bond win.

The legends (worded in the ancient tribal hymn) lie cradled
in the seagull's call.
And all the promises they made are ground beneath the sadist's fall.
The poet and the wise man stand behind the gun,
and signal for the crack of dawn.
Light the sun.

Do you believe in the day? Do you?
Believe in the day! The Dawn Creation of the Kings has begun.
Soft Venus (lonely maiden) brings the ageless one.
Do you believe in the day?
The fading hero has returned to the night -- and fully pregnant with the day,
wise men endorse the poet's sight.
Do you believe in the day? Do you? Believe in the day!

Let me tell you the tales of your life of
your love and the cut of the knife
the tireless oppression
the wisdom instilled
the desire to kill or be killed.
Let me sing of the losers who lie in the street as the last bus goes by.
The pavements are empty: the gutters run red -- while the fool
toasts his god in the sky.

So come all ye young men who are building castles!
Kindly state the time of the year and join your voices in a hellish chorus.
Mark the precise nature of your fear.
Let me help you pick up your dead as the sins of the father are fed
with
the blood of the fools and
the thoughts of the wise and
from the pan under your bed.
Let me make you a present of song as
the wise man breaks wind and is gone while
the fool with the hour-glass is cooking his goose and
the nursery rhyme winds along.

So! Come all ye young men who are building castles!
Kindly state the time of the year and join your voices in a hellish chorus.
Mark the precise nature of your fear.
See! The summer lightning casts its bolts upon you
and the hour of judgement draweth near.
Would you be
the fool stood in his suit of armour or
the wiser man who rushes clear.
So! Come on ye childhood heroes!
Won't your rise up from the pages of your comic-books
your super-crooks and
show us all the way.
Well! Make your will and testament.
Won't you? Join your local government.
We'll have Superman for president
let Robin save the day.
So! Where the hell was Biggles when you needed him last Saturday?
And where were all the sportsmen who always pulled you through?
They're all resting down in Cornwall -- writing up their memoirs
for a paper-back edition of the Boy Scout Manual.

OF COURSE
So you ride yourselves over the fields and
you make all your animal deals and
your wise men don't know how it feels to be thick as a brick.