Picture's in a Mirror - The Incredible String Band

Deep in the hollow jail

Sleeps Lord Randall

The mixed voices speak of bread

And of sheets that were scarlet

And blue are at his head

His heart like a cat drowns in a well

He thinks of all the girls he will not love

He thinks not of the future or of the past

Blue lightning spikes the hills above the sea

Where Kasa’s ship sets sail for otherwhere

There stands the chief with gold on his hair

Two fingers thick each link of coiled ore

Speaks to his white skinned wife, she answers not

He hurls his question angry to the gulls

His wife strikes her mouth with a skull-like sound

The bleeding image of her loss revolves above her mind

With every line in its design, an accusing eye

That pierces Kasa’s soul

The slaves row on beneath the dragon flags

His heart recoils recall his red-haired son

Beneath the burning walls that he razed down

His wife and he speak not as wine is brought

A cup that seethes like the black blood of wolves

His wife’s dagger is hidden in her dress

He drinks joyless to a dark sleep

The gaoler bangs the iron door

Lord Randall wakes in pain

He shakes his shackles

In the beaten gloom

The blood of his wounds is hard as coal

The gaoler leads him out

Upon the blinding bright stair

He feels uneven turf beneath his feet

The priest intones

The sword falls on his neck

The pain is boiling cold

They lay him in the tomb at the break of the day

They close the earthen door upon his clay

The birds are plucking worms from the ground

Their feathers grey as mist on a cloudy morn

Foresters burn branches from the sleeping trees

The white sun turns to stone

My mother lies in her labor nine days long

She called on Saint Bridget in her time

I looked out on the room of my birth

With hangings rich of many strange designs

Nobles stand with their wine cups in the room

Saluting me and she the King’s queen

Already I am forgetting who I am

Already I’ve forgotten who I’ve been

My mother lifts me up to her huge soft breast

Her nipple like a berry both hard and brown

Her eyes look on me like waves of the sea

And with small lips, the yellow milk I draw