Work Not Play - The Jim Carroll Band

The bell rings.

..

It’s a decade past my decadence

My beast wears rings and he’s waiting

In the shadows of my hesitations, my silent

Hesitations.

.. each image is so clear;

It seems i have no hands

The gestures of the air confuse all my demands

And the beast hears the bell;

he comes

Out of the shadows.

he rips apart the shadows.

..

And he says:

«this is work and not play»

And he says:

«there's always more than one way.

..

This is work not play»

I see the ghosts of my childhood.

..

Dressed in blue, they trail me in the night

They drive these cars with real upholstery

They trail me until.

.. here comes the night

She was standing, standing on the balcony

Her black, black eyes folded over her eyelids

Like sheets on motel beds.

..

She must be eatin’reds

This place is filled with mirrors

It echoes what she said

And she said:

«i need a judgement day"and she said:

«i know there’s more than one way,

But i want my judgement day.

.

.»

Repeat refrain

To sleep without dreams

So distant from the mirror

Imitating clarity, disguising

All the terror.

.. i heard a thousand bells

From a thousand old cathedrals

They rang.

.. i haven’t heard them since

A decade past my decadence

The beast hears the bell

I’m cursed to be a singer

A singer of the flames

A thinker of a fire

And a son without a name