Kingfisher

Joanna NewsomJoanna Newsom 

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Joanna Newsom

Joanna Newsom (born January 18, 1982) is an American harpist, pianist and singer-songwriter from Nevada City, California. more »

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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?
Burning within, seen from without
And your gut was a serpent coiling

And for the sake of that pit of 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 darling 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
Like 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 trying
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 immobilized
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 rolling, 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
Saying, 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 its 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

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