when falls the echo on forgotten ground
none of our heroes can come up for air
since there is not one inch's room to spare
for exploration and we must confound
the masters of each noble hill and mound
who watch as we succumb to deep despair
and laugh while those who voice kind words of care
fall silent as our last good hopes are drowned
the long goodnight that none would dare to say
to any who has travelled through that cloud
past all the boundaries of human grime
is spoken now so we might reach a day
when all that's visible all that's allowed
within the reach of normal common time
is but the text of one less moral play

no one recalls the red bird's haunting song
in dead of winter but it marks the spring
the creature's small and yet its voice is strong

what we discover when we fall among
the hordes who struggle to avoid the sting
(no one recalls the red bird's haunting song

but has a sense that they are drawn along
into the silence) is the sharp high ring
the creature's small and yet its voice is strong

enough to to let  us know that we belong
in this strange place where all our hopes may cling
no one recalls the red bird's haunting song

and yet when choruses turn to a throng
we want so urgently our hearts to fling
the creature's small  and yet its voice is strong

enough for us to know it is not wrong
to feel its force and want ourselves to sing
no one recalls the red bird's haunting song
the creature's small and yet its voice is strong

whatever happens there is no regret
for tempests that  have shredded new-leaved trees
awakening the youthful from their ease
into a present that is all upset
where each is cast at once deep into debt
not knowing whom to help nor whom to please
frozen in place by the harsh sky's decrees
and driven only to hard fear and fret
still there are signs that we have not been told
all that we need in order to get by
the simple passage of each normal plight
instead we're warned to be urgent and bold
focus inhuman danger in the eye
but not be lured by any trick of light

long toil will end when good folk all agree
on what is just and how the work divides
and on this morning we all wake up free

so many years that each lack harmony
we seemed only to wait for changing tides
long toil will end when good folk all agree

on how we fare and how we stand to see
the ones who move or that which still abides
and on this morning we all wake up free

the music plays with skill and constancy
while one who would have punished simply hides
long toil will end when good folk all agree

on codes of honour sitting by the sea
watch as the last bad soldier changes sides
and on this morning we all wake up free

so now we gather under an old tree
to give our promises and choose our guides
long toil will end when good folk all agree
and on this morning we all wake up free

when we are lost in rapture at the sight
of the spring flowers at last fully blown
we are then healed down to the very bone
of the last vestiges of winter's blight
so too when we have passed beyond the night
into another domain of the known
where once again we cease to be alone
we can be certain that the world is right
the simple magics are the ones most true
not to feel terror at the change of time
yet to be awed that life returns again
in all those places that the sun makes new
so we rejoice in the slow upward climb
and let our bodies cast away their pain

where all the edges reach into the heart
are no clear corners nor a single sign
that time is changing the dividing line
is never crossed yet all are kept apart
by the hard means of some still arcane art
which the most foolish will insist divine
or claim as kindly warm tender benign
although they bleed from entry of the dart
we're far into the strange realm of the blind
where all the rules evil and perverse
and every bullet seems to find its mark
dead centre but the lying human mind
insists reality can't be adverse
that all is light down here deep in the dark

in all our doings there’s a rule we make
about the bounds beyond which we won’t go
those limits of the matters we may know
or of the facts in which we may partake
like the good flints that sharpen when they flake
or that swift stream with hidden deeper flow
beneath the mountain with the secret glow
all of the places that we can’t forsake
within each heart are truths that none may speak
yet in our song they’re vibrant in their call
to warm the spirit and release the mind
allowing us the harmony to seek
beyond the power of the strong and tall
right into where the force of love must bind