Heian
I've got a girl, man, back in Heian
Stand at her door, man, all night long
Tap-tap-tapping like the cry of the kuina bird
Knocking on the cedar and singing this song, man
Well she a plump puffy woman, man, small eyes, pale skin
Lots of white pan, man, on her face
Blackens her teeth man, plucks her brows, man
Paints them back in a different place
She got soft strong hair, man, down to there, man
Washes it for hours while her servants stand by
She's never nude, man, six layers deep, man
Colours from the leaves, and colours from the sky
I've got a girl, man, back in Heian
Plump puffy woman, man, small eyes, pale skin
Blackens her teeth man, plucks her brows, man
Paints them back in a different place
She's not a virgin, who needs that, man
Virgins are possessed by demons
She's got a room with a portable screen, man
Three attendants, and she's my woman
Gotta tear away, man, head down to Taiwan
Cool my heels with some bubble pearl tea
Get my head together then it's back to Heian
Where my girl, man, waits for me
The Tick of the Clock
I nearly forgot the tick of the clock
Until my hero died, yeah
I nearly forgot the tick of the clock
Until my leader lied, yeah
The chug of the feed I reluctantly read
Into the white and blue
The hands of the clock, the wall of the dock
The swell of the rising tide, yeah
The beautiful girls who take me away
From thoughts of my suicide, yeah
The sting of the rain, the weather has changed
We're now in a parallel world
And Bowie is dead, my father is dead
And Britain has sailed away, yeah
And populist tools punk us like fools
Gilding their power with our pain, yeah
And everyone's fine, but everyone's dying
The people who mattered are gone
And this, I am told, is how you get old
The need to be out of touch, yeah
I don't want to be in harmony
With things that I hate so much, yeah
The tick of the clock, the creep of the rot
Eating the future away
Art and Design
When the world is a mess and children are strapped to the torture machines
And dictators clamp down, sending their troops to the centre of things
That's when I turn to art and design, the only two things I can truly call mine
When they kill journalists for just doing their job and just telling the truth
And when it's suddenly fine for the streets to resound with racist abuse
That's when I turn to art and design, to beautiful things from beautiful minds
And artists who look see visions of alternate universes
And designers have put all this beauty into the things around us
And that's why I turn to art and design, political things that aren't yet a crime
The most beautiful flowers spring, so they say, from the throats of dead kings
And the beautiful powers come when people themselves control the machine
That's why I turn to art and design, beautiful things that change minds
Little Girls
Little girls, little girls will save us
Little virgins pure as snow
When the end of the world is upon us
When there's no place left to go
The public loves a flogging or a public execution
When you behead the blood is red, there's no other solution
The public loves severity, the cutting-off of tongues
The torture of the foreigner, the rattle of the guns
But little girls, little girls will save us
Though they may seem weak and frail
The human-headed Blengins of Calverine Island
Save the world from epic fail
And our life is a nest of vipers
Our behaviour a world of pain
And our life is windscreen wipers
Trying to keep up with the rain
Speak harshly to your fellow man and slap him when he slackens
Try imposing martial law, sit back and see what happens
The milk of human kindness is old and out of date
The public needs a populist to make the nation great
But little girls, little girls will save us
Though they may seem weak and frail
The human-headed Blengins of Calverine Island
Save the world from epic fail
The public is sadistic and its bloodlust knows no bounds
The tiniest infraction and it throws you to the hounds
The public needs a figurehead, a filthy kind of father
To objectify its anger, and its hatred of the other
But we'll defeat the Glandolinian vandals
For the sake of the Vivian Girls
With the cumulonimbus behind us
The dearest flowers in all the world
Little girls, little girls will save us
In the lightning and the summer snow
When the end of the world is upon us
When there's no place left to go
Cabin Porn
They want and get their country back
And start to build a little shack
Up in the woods, along the track
Away from all that they have borne
Away from foreigners and towns
Away from mortarboards and gowns
They scratch a living from the soil
In cabin porn
They grow a tree, they start a blog
They milk the pig, they kill the dog
For weeks and weeks they see no-one
They are so meek their face is gone
They call themselves "the frozen ones"
And they could soon be born again
Dug up like unexploded bombs
In cabin porn
They're total cocks, they're all the same
With their apocalyptic brains
They've turned their backs on urban life
The multi-culti dream has gone
Don't call them trash or insular
They may be rash, they may be poor
But we will all be islanders in cabin porn
They write a pungent little screed against modernity
A manifesto, so it seems, against basic literacy
They cannot use apostrophes, they cannot spell "hypocrisy"
Their manifesto goes unread by everyone except God
They think that man was not designed
To live with men with different minds
They think the world will come to them
They plan hide and bide their time
It starts to rain, they wait for dawn
They know the rest will be along
The day the pure embrace the lure of cabin porn
They want and get their country back
And start to build their little shack
Away from experts and from blacks
In cabin porn
The Death of Empedokles
Empedokles the philosopher famously declared
That everything is made of fire and water, earth and air
He came from Agrigentum on the Sicilian plain
And also said that motion is the only kind of change
Straub & Huillet made four films of the death of Empedokles
And each one showed the Holderlin play
With tiny differences
Our philosopher hero
Stands in the wood and sighs
That the townspeople have kicked him out
Because he claims to be divine
The rustling flick of a lizard, the constant change of light
The passing clouds, the sound of birds
And the wind that stirs the pines
Empedokles climbs the volcano
To throw himself right in
The townsfolk seem to change their minds
And come to plead with him
The bark of a dog, the crow of a cock
And the sound of a faraway jet
Empedokles, with a mind to die, ascends the volcano summit
The horrible smell of sulphur, lightning bright or dim
A philosopher up on Etna
Is now jumping off the rim
Icek Judko
Hard disk, coat hanger, deck shoes, record-player
The complete works of Sir Walter Scott
Bubblewrap, sleeping bag, underwear
PG Tips, Macbook Air
Wireless mouse, polythene house
Mechanical lung, tatami dust
Nail-clippers, scuba flippers
Egg-whisk, cheese-grater
Hello Kitty pregnancy test
Egg-whisk, cheese-grater
Mixer, chick peas
Lodger in original sleeve
Cunt colouring book
Icek Judko
Who would be intelligent
When they could be stupid?
Who would follow Apollo
When they could follow Cupid?
Who would be a poet, mate
When they could be fake
Who would act correctly
When they could make mistakes?
Hard disk, coat hanger, deck shoes, record-player
The complete works of Sir Walter Scott
Bubblewrap, sleeping bag, underwear
PG Tips, Macbook Air
Wireless mouse, polythene house
Mechanical lung, tatami dust
Nail-clippers, scuba flippers
Egg-whisk, cheese-grater
Hello Kitty pregnancy test
Who would be generous
When they could be mean?
Who would be an Einstein
When they could all be Mr Bean?
Who would be a prophet, mate
When they could be a loss?
You can stay a scobberlotcher
We couldn't give a toss
Icek Judko
Neo-Weimar
I am a camera in neo-Weimar
Panning the faces in collapsing worlds
Is it my place to question this state of mind
When all I can do is capture the light?
Places I never knew seem so familiar now
And places I knew before far away
Urban Berlin or a village in Africa
My shutter is set to the speed of the world
We are the cameras of neo-Weimar
Trying to show the cost of everything
All that we need slips through our fingers now
All we can do is capture the light
I am a camera in neo-Weimar
Panning the faces in collapsing worlds
Is it my place to question this state of things
When all I can do is capture the light?
The Brothers
People always ask us how deep is our love
We reply "deep enough"
But people always ask us exactly how we
Share one girl between three
Three for all, all for one for three
We taste your love in the morning sun
Three for all, all for one
We feel your touch in the morning rain
Feel us now, feel our pain
Three for all, all for one for three
You have three ways three can reach
We shall learn, you shall teach
You come three ways, once for each
Of the brothers, the brothers
People find it weird, and people get bothered
Ask if we're Mormoms like the Osmond brothers
People should simply let us be
We just love differently
Three for all, all for one for three
You have three ways three can reach
We shall learn, you shall teach
You come three ways, once for each
Of the brothers, the brothers
People get ready for a better life
Like three brothers who share a wife
How deep is love for fools and creeps?
We would say "not so deep"
Three for all, all for one for three
You have three ways three can reach
We shall learn, you shall teach
You come three ways, once for each
Of the brothers, the brothers
Perlenschwein
There was a golden amphora
Hidden in a baby's crib in Azerbaijan
With the blacksmith gathering flowers in the wind
General Judas quashed the rebellion of the poodles
'Til he was crushed in turn by General Gingersnap
At an amateur fatalist centre
Ezra Pound was a hipster Hitler
Dispensing arbitrary prejudicial judgments left and right
Kidlat Tahimik and Olaudah Equiano
Drinking flute juice with a geriatric gobbler
On an ark to Singapore
Hidden in an amphora an owl made of pink porcelain
20th century, ultra-Italian
In the communist Asian theatre where folk tales are a thing
An orange Tyro leads the black men of Michelangelo Pistoletto
And three nudes dancing gamely on one leg
They share and share alike
Through Benjamin Britten's interrupted metamorphosis
A new song at a love moon, and the dances caused by fear
Eternity for little people lasts just thirteen years
I was informed by Monsieur Perlenschwein
Fluttering lovely murderer's hands
At the Insula Dulcamara
A rotating black sun, an arrow, and a messenger in flames
And I just want to be naked
Distress caused by aridity and the plant-analytic
Cave flower therapist dressed as a big-eared clown
The Olympic Games restaged as a stag rutting performance
While Cardinal Pirelli sings "Oh yeah, and a heap of dung"
I had a dream of hazelraw, they say it's lucky, for
It makes a dish to set before a queen
Corked up in a golden amphora
Hidden in a baby's crib in Azerbaijan
Bullshit
If you want to be hot, shake what you've got
If you want to make art, just start
If you want to make pop, say what you mean
Stick it to a backbeat
Bullshit
To get to the top you've got to stab a few backs
But that never stopped the ambitious
What use are backs to the gormless, the spineless?
Fuck em all, get vicious
Bullshit
The shape of the halogen headlamps on cars
Says all you need to know about progress
They used to be friendly and civic and round
But now they are scowling and furious
Bullshit
I once met a girl who was lovely and wise
And built my own Taj Mahal to her
But Standard & Poor's downgraded her credit
Now she lives in a sewer
Bullshit
These are the days of the decline of the West
Their semi-fascism's gone
They had their day, now it's time for the rest
To be semi-fascist in turn
Bashibazouks
Everything's continuously flying away to hell
Because of the stupidity of people
Idiocy hurts, and if idiots went to church
This would be their fucking cathedral
I'm at the ATM, and coming out instead of cash
Is a wedge of pigeon feathers and saliva mixed with ash
What's happening in Little England is becoming clear:
They are dealing with the problem of evil
The pillywink and thumbiken are making their return
Along with every other type of screw
I am paying at the pump the price for some pamphlet of hate-spew
Published back in 1692
I wouldn't call these people "people", more like feral sheep
Slobs and yobbos, bozos, drunks and devils
Gimlet-eyed bully herds, sneering little creeps
Fustylugs and fungus-sniffers, driggle-draggle, gasbag-lovers
Drate-pokes and their gnashgabs
Klazomaniacs, loitersacks and quisbies, whiffle-whaffle, muckspouts and roiderbanks
Snoutbrigands, scobberlotchers, sorners, and the raggabrashing rabble
Knuckle-dragging bashibazouks
April is regarding me with curious concern
I've been land-surveying Greenland on the Streetview
And May demands to know if I would like to clipe my neighbours up
For half-a-crown of billyballoo
My boss requests a Facebook chat while I am on the toilet seat
Brushing up upon my rusty evil
What's happening here in Little England is becoming clear
They are dealing with the devil
Year Zero
People from the countryside kill people from the city
People who are ugly kill people who are pretty
People who are puritans slay the permissive
And people who are retrograde cut down the progressive
Stickers-up for foreigners kill stickers to their own
Liars kill the nitpickers who like to moan
The poor read the graffiti, rise up and eat the rich
And Little Goody Twoshoes is feeling sick
And the ones who say the emperor is naked slaughter those
Who swear by all that's holy that he must be wearing clothes
And someone told me yesterday year zero's on the way
And all is quiet at the end of the day
The frigid have arrived to kill the masturbators
Punctual people punctually kill procrastinators
So-called Christians murder so-called Muslims day and night
And black people are killed for failing to be white
The boring kill the interesting and then get very bored
Insomniacs slyly stifle everyone who snores
Invalids crush the able-bodied with their Zimmer frames
And people with no past kill people with no name
Invaded people everywhere are invading their invaders
And no-one feels the benefits except the arms traders
And one is heard very philosophically to say:
"At least all is quiet at the end of the day"
Warmongers kill the peaceful, to be killed in return
When the peaceful come in the early hours to burn their houses down
Tracksuit types kill pitbull dykes and old philanthropists
Free market evangelists kill kindly socialists
Scandinavian vegans kill British bully beef
Everyone called Simon kills everyone called Keith
The blind slaughter the sighted and the slighted slash the blind
The Buddhists kill everyone who comes to mind
The people in the cafes kill the people in the bars
Saxophonists weep and strangle creeps who play guitars
And when you ask Siri why, Siri simply says:
"At least all is quiet at the end of the day"
And the ones who say the emperor is naked slaughter those
Who swear by all that's holy that he must be wearing clothes
And someone told me yesterday year zero's on the way
And all is quiet at the end of the day
What Are Facts?
What are facts, Jack? A game we have to play
Stumbling blocks, Jack, scattered in our way
By our foes, Jack, cowardly enemies
With whom facts, Jack, apparently agree
What are facts, Jack? It's always puzzled me
When I take power, Jack, there'll be some changes, see
When I've bagged, Jack, the presidency
Facts will knock, Jack, before they visit me
What are facts, Jack? I tell you day is night
If you like, Jack, you can say I'm right
All that counts is to agree with what I say
Facts are crap, Jack, they get in the way
What are facts, Jack? What are they anyway?
Everything's interpretation anyway
Climate change, Jack, a point of view to spin
If you like, Jack, it isn't happening
Fact-check Jack, you haven't got a clue
You check facts, have you nothing real to do?
Check this out, Jack, power is all that counts
Power, power and power, power, power and power
What are facts, Jack, strap them to the bed
Wave a stun prod around their pretty heads
Facts shrink fast before a taser or a gun
Facts are cowards, Jack, just like anyone
Fact check Jack, let me make this clear
Facts are dead, Jack, starting next year
Me and Vlad, Jack, have a little plan
From Jan 1, Jack, facts are banned
Imperial
One by one they disappear
The liberties we once had here
Another time is coming now
Imperial, imperial, imperial
Why cling to what can never be?
One by one they're led away
The aliens, the bright, the gay
Another race is coming now
Imperial, imperial, imperial
Why cling to your democracy?
The Counting Song
One to begin you, two to bid you, three to bite you, and four to blow you, five to break you, six to bring you, seven to burst you, and eight to catch you
Nine to choose you, ten to come you, eleven to dive you, and twelve to do you, thirteen to drag you, fourteen to draw you, fifteen to drink you, and sixteen to drown you
Seventeen to drive you, eighteen to eat you, nineteen to fall you, twenty to fight you, twenty-one to flee you, twenty-two to flow you, twenty-three to fly you, and twenty-four to forsake you
Twenty-five to freeze you, twenty-six to give you, twenty-seven to go you, and twenty-eight to grow you, twenty-nine to hang you, thirty to hide you, thirty-one to know you, and thirty-two to lay you
Thirty-three to lead you, thirty-four to lie you, thirty-five to raise you, and thirty-six to ride you, thirty-seven to ring you, thirty-eight to rise you, thirty-nine to run you, and forty to see you
Forty-one to set you, forty-two to shake you, forty-three to shine you, and forty-four to show you, forty-five to shrink you, forty-six to sing you, forty-seven to sink you, and forty-eight to sit you
Forty-nine to slay you, fifty to speak you, fifty-one to spring you, and fifty-two to steal you, fifty-three to strive you, fifty-four to swear you, fifty-five to swim you, and fifty-six to swing you
Fifty-seven to take you, fifty-eight to tear you, fifty-nine to throw you, and sixty to wake you, sixty-one to wear you, sixty-two to weave you, sixty-three to wring you, and sixty-four to write you
One to begin you, two to bid you, three to bite you, and four to blow you, five to break you, six to bring you, seven to burst you, and eight to catch you
Pessoa
Seventy mes with their pen-names
In an age of barbarians
My name is multiplicity, disquietude, indeterminacy
Life is drama, life is verse, life is written in the universe
Live for now, don't rehearse, seventy mes fit one hearse
My name is multiplicity, disquietude, indeterminacy
A maelstrom in a vacuum, walking stiff
Through the geometry of the abyss
Ferdinand Pessoa put it cleverly
When he said we have seventy mes
Seventy mes with their pen-names
In an age of barbarians
The past is all I failed to be
The future all I've yet to be
Sick of having just one me
I created seventy
Seventy mes from the same egg hatched
Siamese twins unattached
Souls impatient with their limits
Each one trying to be what it isn't
The meaning of my life has been to dream
To casually observe what I think I mean
To fill my hands with that sand called gold
Open my fingers and out it rolls
I am happy to be no-one
The outskirts of a nonexistent town
The margins of a withering page
The prologue to an unwritten age
If what happens to me happens to you
Then to tell you tells you nothing new
But if what happens to me happens only to me
Nothing I can say will ever make you see
The past is all I failed to be
The future all I've yet to be
Sick of having just one me
I created seventy
By woodside grove and woodland rushes
There's hush and crush in the brush and bushes
On left the holt, on right the meadow
O hey, it rings and sings in sunshine and shadow
Seventy mes with their pen-names
In an age of barbarians
My name is multiplicity, disquietude, indeterminacy
Life is drama, life is verse, life is written in the universe
Live for now, don't rehearse, seventy mes fit one hearse
The past is all I failed to be
The future all I've yet to be
Sick of having just one me
I created seventy
Ass
Ass, recharging your phone up on the stage, they've started Act One
You're on the set, you're in the play, what'll you do?
Ass in a horrible dream you are alone, no lines to say
You're in a play, it's got to go on, but nothing comes
Ass, the prompter is there, under the stage, hissing at you
Ruddy with rage, you can't hear what he says, he sounds like a snake
Ass, make something up, really who cares? Something about love
Kittens or bears, gallons of gas, pull it out of your ass
Ass where is your voice? You utter a word, but there's no noise
Everyone stares, you are a star, so dead and so far
Ass, for once in your life wouldn't you like to reach into your ass
And deep in the crack find a beautiful speech everyone needs?
Quick, open the crack, scrabble around, they'll give you a pass
Playing for time, it'll be fine, never again
Ass, make something up, really who cares, something about love
Kittens or bears, gallons of gas, ass
Hatecrush
The big thing left for me to do
Would be to reconcile with you
But staying as you are, forever mad
I'd say that's also okay
It's passionate in its own way
To be your hatecrush isn't bad
You mattered more than anybody
There is no-one else like you, and I should know
I've scoured the world
Your pleasing face, your pleasing form
Your tastes so far beyond the norm
And though you live across the sea
You're still so deep inside me
When I think about the world I see your face
Your genetic Venn Diagram, Malaysia and Pakistan
Was something immigration could do
But now we're living in an age of borders and baricades
And there'll be fewer made like you
And though you live across the sea
You're still so deep inside me
When I think about the world I see your face
And though perhaps you hate me now
I know, or I suspect somehow
There's something we both hate more than that
The world in which people who
Combine to make a girl like you
Are crushed before they meet
And though you live across the sea
You're still so deep inside me
When I think about the world I see your face
The Torch
At last I'm unimportant now
The world forgot my name
The girls all lost my number now
Police don't hold me long
They ask who killed the elephants
But never breathe my name
I must have killed a few, you know
But someone else is always blamed
The bliss of disobservitude
I dodge your shafting gaze
In society's blindspot
Hiding in the haze
They ask who killed the eskimos
No-one holds me to blame
I must have killed a few, you know
But someone else is always blamed
Now I resemble multitudes
The hordes that you've ignored
The homeless refugees, you know
Your wretched and your poor
In darkness we sprawl huddled now
Free of any doubt
Unending disobservitude
The torch is out
Index