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Out of the Fertile Crescent

by Ballydowse

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1.
We cradle in our arms your terror, the soldiers that you fight Disguised as our children, they starve. Behold your enemy Ringed around the village of the brazen infidel As their eyes sink in, you can feel your muscles swell Catapults throw hunger into bellies brave and small While kings discuss the benefits in laden banquet halls In Mosul in northern Iraq's no fly zone, we saw flocks of sheep Which had been blasted to eternity with the small child shepherds Who tended them. No other targets in sight You cradle in your arms the terror that will bring the ceiling down Crashing on your children, the harvest of this seed In Mosul where Jonah rests the sheep are waging war They dared to raise their eyes when the planes above them roared On the sands of Babylon we lay down and wept Morning light on you! Oh, vengeance we expect
2.
Some days you tread the grass tipping the toe in awe Some days you draw the sword, some nights you spit at the stars We serve a God of grief and pleasure. We swim in passion and tears Fasting fill our minutes but feasting fills our years We're no sons of prohibition, no daughters of frozen beds Pan and the nymph's weak shadows of the fires joined and wed Seems you misunderstand me, not ice but blood in our guts We're sober 'cause we're waiting for our Lord to drink with us Been told we're rules and repression, weak in minds and taste But only the one who has mastered desire ever has ridden its strength I will not sit your silly perch, I got both wings on me Judging from your paintin' of us I don't think you can see A joy that outdances the pagans. A taste for moon and sun Great board of wine and laughter when the watch of night is done Sing of some pale Galilean, greying the world with his breath This wraith is not my master; in fact we've never met
3.
And they walk a thousand miles south And they wear our gags upon their mouths Yet they will rise, with dignity and grace Open the records, shine a light in secret places And finally the world will see Guatemala Behold the marks upon her Mayan daughters Seed the earth between the anvil and the hammer The generals and the wealthy flew the same bloody banner You offered them as martyrs but that was not your right God's instruments of change sometimes walk beneath our sight Indeed to take up violence can be the worst of votes But before you criticize spend the night inside their booths On him they spent their rage yet never did he speak No safe house was given up, a dam that would not leak He held your filthy torrents till you finally put him down Her love let loose the waters but it's you who will be drowned You will never understand how the truth can pass thru bars It flies above the night and writes the names upon the stars 100 cigarette burns like maps upon her back Led home to Washington by the strings of the attack Look into her eyes the crazy isn't there It's in the embassies and palaces filling every chair This northern land is ours, for us judgment starts here If indeed we fed the death squads our repentance should be dear Master Mine look to the south Open your ears and close your mouth We turn the river and thank our gods They fight the thirst against all odds No more, no more the cry comes drifting back Are grey skies growing lighter or will they fade to black?
4.
There is a land and there is sea you're the spot just between Where the wall grow the thinnest to the hidden majesty There is joy and there is grief, where they lap there is just belief And I know that the sweetest glimpse of faith is in your eyes Between night and day when the whites they are grays And the green world wears a pale blue mask upon its face I step through I fall in a long lost home I've never been I cannot stay forever but I'll never leave again "One road leads to London one road runs to Wales My road lead me seawards to the white dipping sails Leads me, lures me, calls me to salt green tossing sea A road without earth's road-dust is the right road for me" But one voice holds me steady, one voice hold me here It's the voice of my only love calling me near "A wet road heaving, shining, and wild with seagulls' cries A mad salt sea-wind blowing salt spray in my eyes" But I can let it wait, I can leave it all behind For standing still with you is a journey of a kind Like a jaunt upon an ocean of holy memories Sails full and constant with a sweet stinging breeze "I may go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that's hardest to deny I may go down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy's life To the gull's way and the whale's way Where the wind's like a whetted knife" But I'll not go alone my love from this day on I swear Whatever current lays below, you and I will share
5.
Birth like a drunkard reels and tosses me wet into the fields surrounded by a company familiar and strange Dangled like Achilles, dripping on the floor The brine of a fateful journey, delivered to the door Of ritual and custom, the woman and the man With silver ring in the sight of all I took my lover's hand Deep drums beat beneath skin-covered ivory cages Patterns that we learned when the leaves shut out the skies Turned face to face near the night fire, walls allowing Is that the savannah still caught up in your eyes? Two hunt as one for the passion that can bridge the grave Gathering vows to love and to be Walls dripping, Spirit digging eternal words from primate tongues Dance before their burning and come next to me Bottoms up—drink each day down Loyalty poured by mercy Call but one name—another round Commitment is a thirsting Wedlock step to ancient tunes Till lungs they are a bursting' Bottoms up—drink each day down Commitment is a thirsting Deep drums beat beneath skin-covered ivory cages Patterns that we learned when the leaves shut out the skies Turned face to face across the bright pyre of any others That which could have been, laugh as it dies Two hunt as one for the passion that can bridge the grave Quickening vows to love and to be Desires ebb but to return glowing embers roar and burn Dance before that fire and come next to me
6.
7.
Jan 18, 1943 04:36
Five fathoms down submission lies Its bones of coral made Too often Torquemadas lead The brightest to the grave The ideas of Christ are actions Take courage heart of mine And cease to idle fancy Step across the line The enemy hearkens—a beast in the darkness The amuser it wakes in my hand I imagine a day when resignation is violence And know I would feel the command In Vilna beat plowshares to swords In the face of their pain pacifism unglues S'vet a poyk tun trot: Meer ze-nen do The enemy hearkens a beast in the darkness It measures and qualifies me How deep can it drink the blood of the people? Before my vows are released With each day of fumbling, does action learn something? When will Love find its opposable thumb? Will it reach as it prays or preach while it stays And bask in noblest pledges undone? The enemy turns—his humanity burns me To avoid the fist we will try Despise the crusader—reject the invader But when must the ghetto arise? Song of my fathers a voice in the darkness The amuser it drops from my hand I dream of a day when the violent are emptied And peace is the only command
8.
Hand over hand see the banner rise, from the depths of the ghost a deep bell cries Driving us forth from our slumbers in Notre Dame Down from the bell tower, leap on board, break the anchor, mock the shore Rejoice in the toss and roll of our liberty Lash the oars to our hands and let us pull We're sick of these suffocating landlocked days of talk and drool What's it like to love where you're going? Further on and further in till these eyes are closin' Recalled to life by a kingdom come, beggars and hunchbacks everyone We leave each wave with no regret 'cause the next brings what it needs We share the Christ tribe stories and the meaning songs that some have labeled White lie wrongs from the infancy of man Catch our answer if you can Exiled to finally breathe am I Doomed to actually see the sky And the waters in all their glory The best are the truest of stories The best are the truest of stories
9.
One is a slow and melancholy maid; I know not if she cometh from the skies Or from the sleepy gulfs, but she will rise Often before me in the twilight shade Holding a bunch of poppies and a blade Of springing wheat: prostrate my body lies Before her on the turn, the while she ties A fillet of the weed about my head; And in the gaps of sleep I seem to hear A gentle rustle like the stir of corn And words like odours thronging to my ear: "Lie still, beloved—still until morn; Lie still with me upon this rolling sphere— Still till the judgment; thou art faint and worn" The other meets me in the public throng; Her hair streams backward from her loose attire; She hath a trumpet and an eye of fire; She points me downward, steadily and long:— "There is thy grave—arise, my son, be strong! Hands are upon thy crown—awake, aspire To immortality; heed not the lyre Of the Enchantress nor her poppy song, But in the stillness of the summer calm Tremble for what is Godlike in thy being Listen a while, and thou shalt hear the psalm Of victory sung by creatures past thy seeing; And from far battle-fields there comes the neighing Of dreadful onset, though the air is balm" Maid with the poppies, must I let thee go? Alas, I may not; thou are likewise dear! I am but human, and thou has a fear When she hath not but splendour, and the glow Of a wild energy that mocks the flow Of the poor sympathies which keep us here: Lay past thy poppies, and come twice as near And I will teach thee, and thou too shalt grow; And thou shalt walk with me in open day Through the rough thoroughfares with quiet grace; And the wild visaged maid shall lead the way Timing her footsteps to a gentler pace As her great orbs turn ever on thy face Drinking in draughts of loving help alway Sister Snowdrop died before we were born She came like a bride in a snowy morn What is a bride? What is snow? Never tried. Do not know. Now let us moan and cover her over Primrose is gone. All but the flower Here is a leaf. Lay her upon it Follow in grief. Pocket has done it. Deeper, poor creature! Winter may come He cannot reach her—that is the hum SHe is buried, the beauty! Now she is done That was the duty. Now for the fun.
10.
The Channel 04:12
How many mornings lay against their evenings With nothing worth remembering in between The last dune rises in the lower glass One pull would snap these bracelets clean Walk me to the edge of no returning Let the hands lead the tongue into unlearning The likes of which my eyes have never seen The gates of the Bastille hang from their hinges No more waiting for the living to begin Lather me from head to toe in sheep fat For the cold dark channel I shall swim What do you offer that we really need? What do you starve—what do you feed? Artless forms untouched by craft No potter's breath just industrial draft Technicians fill our empty feeders With bits of business from producing theatres We're consumed and all the junk remains The gates of the Bastille hang from their hinges Cut the cords of possessions from my neck Toss your scepter in the mud, Otto of Brunswick Naked we will walk from this wreck The chains of shallow solutions Protect arrogance from the persecutions Without which Faith will surely die Look full in the eyes that suffer The fighter is the only lover One pull would snap those bracelets clean The gates of the Bastille hang from their hinges Run out beyond their swaying pipes so string We sleep not with crusaders or cynics We'll wake tomorrow in the rain where we belong
11.
Crescent 07:00
Fertile crescent of fire and dirt traded for knowledge, what was it worth? Yesterday's desires are stronger today. We eat our fill but hungry we stay Like the hips of the snake emptied I am of reasons to dance on, my lover's like sand That slips through my fingers without a trace that something sacred slept in this place Four rivers flow past the beaks and the jaws Anarchy, Judgment, Mercy, and Law New cities rise upon history's dust. Cultures revolve between wonder and lust Guillotine blades release peasants and slaves. Peasants turn princes and chain them again The rivers flow on, they join and they grow Mixing life and death into all that we know Steep the last steps from nature to man The altar, the fiddle, and a little girl's dance She moves through the hills and sings to the night Of Eden and serpents and dizzying heights Each morning she wakens and knows she won't end A new creature rises against one that descends We're on our own again, my friend, the vanguard's been derailed They'll hang me next to you, my friend, as they follow in our trail Too late we see the broken heart is the seed of the broken state Remember me in paradise, tell them I couldn't wait A future's on its way, my friend, where hate will be like gills Gills that cannot breathe, my friend, in the sharp air of the hills We saw so clear the rights of all, the path was the mistake The vanguard is forgiveness, the light for which we ache
12.
You crawl up into your bed and pull the worn thin blanket over your head Trying hard to momentarily escape the touch you feel What is the worth of soul and skin? Price plummets down As each one comes in As if such short-armed men could ever reach that sacred place I am the God of Rahab I see past flesh and culture Never do I mistake the songbird for the vulture Your life burns pure before my eyes I name the virgin I crush the flies They dress you in scarlet but all that I know Is the child you are is white like the snow Bangkok sun creeps out red-faced but without shame It knits in fire upon the hills the purity of your name Other names are knitted too but black the thread They form a noose rising slowly but steadily A gallows for grown men to hang their own hearts Pour from your soul the rice your family needs to eat Like Mary pouring oil on the Son of God's feet A child should sleep through the dark in peace Another night's over, light comes to the east Pull your blanket over our head it's us who are dead

credits

released July 1, 2000

Andrew Mandell—vocals
Robina Mandell—vocals
Nate Peters—vocals, guitar, mandolin
Darren Davick—guitar, vocals, bass, octave mandolin
Brian Grover—bass, singing bowls, didgeridoo, throat singing
Dan Kool—vocals, bodhrán, concertina
Levi Nerad—drums
Donnie Anderson—drums
Dave Baumgartner—violin

Guest appearances:
Tony Krogh—highland bagpipes
Hilde Bialach—cello

Recorded at Wilson Warehouse, Tone Zone Recording, and Electrical Audio in Chicago by Steve Albini.
"Sons and Daughters" recorded by Ed Bialach along with several vocal tracks and other life-saving favors.
Master by John Golden Mastering.

Craig Holland wrote the music to "Weapons of Mass Destruction"

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Ballydowse Chicago, Illinois

Ballydowse is a folk punk band that sang of social and economic injustice.

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