The serpent writhed before the feathered god
with the maggots and the acrobats all face down in the sod
I travelled south and east to find some things that used to be
when I got there just as far as the eye could see
was just miles and miles of chimneys alone
and blackened fields and forests and what’s left of rock and stone
there’s still a temple in this place, there’s still a shrine at its surbase
but all the gods of good and right have left without a trace
there’s something slippery in the walls, there’s something hidden in the drawers
I took one final look and I said
take me away

I met a little girl with an old wooden box
with the varnish all tarnished and rust upon the locks
I asked her what was in it, she looked at me and sighed
“are you asking out of interest or asking our of pride?
“see my father put me under house arrest
and went to feed the bin-born babies nestled in their cardboard nests
so you ask what’s in the case, and I tell you to your face
it’s all my hopes and dreams and things I wish I could erase”
and he slides in the walls while she cries in the halls
she falls to her knees and says
take me away

now my peg-leg has splintered and my false teeth have rotted
in my garden of wattles and broken plastic bottles
I wallow in my glory, in my filth, my ugliness
‘neath the pale winter sun in all her specious loveliness
now you stay up in your tower and hope that you’ll survive
now that I’m the roadkill on your lovely country drive
it’s the drip of the still, it’s the needles and pills
now all your misery is grist to the mill
now the pipes shake the walls while she cries in the halls
she tears at her hair and says
take me away

the blind man and the lady, the internecine affair
while they focused on themselves they led us to the serpents lair
now the reptile king the smuggest grin, we’re firmly in their grasp
while the rest of us struggle on and those above us laugh
and they tried so hard to seem politically correct
so they went and outlawed music because that excludes the deaf
and I railed ‘til I wept, I scratched ‘til I bled
and I retched ‘til I spewed and I spewed ‘til I retched.

“oh well” she says “we just have to suffer it now
but most things hurt when I’m around
in another three years maybe we’ll try again
then again it might all be over by then”
and they make you pay bills for the water they bleach and they charge you for dreaming and tax you for sleep
and all revenue goes to the Mechanical Priest, he’s got the king in his pocket and he owns the police
and he slides through the walls while she cries in the halls
she claws at her skin and says
take me away