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cyril cusack - lapis lazuli lyrics

i have heard that hysterical women say
they are sick of the palette and fiddle+bow
of poets that are always gay
for everybody knows or else should know
that if nothing drastic is done
aeroplane and zeppelin will come out
pitch like king billy bomb+b+lls in
until the town lie beaten flat

all perform their tragic play
there struts hamlet, there is lear
that’s ophelia, that cordelia;
yet they, should the last scene be there
the great stage curtain about to drop
if worthy their prominent part in the play
do not break up their lines to weep
they know that hamlet and lear are gay;
gaiety transfiguring all that dread
all men have aimed at, found and lost;
black out; heaven blazing into the head:
tragedy wrought to its uttermost
though hamlet rambles and lear rages
and all the drop scenes drop at once
upon a hundred thousand stages
it cannot grow by an inch or an ounce
on their own feet they came, or on shipboard
camel+back, horse+back, ass+back, mule+back
old civilisations put to the sword
then they and their wisdom went to rack:
no handiwork of callimachus
who handled marble as if it were bronze
made draperies that seemed to rise
when sea+wind swept the corner, stands;
his long lamp chimney shaped like the stem
of a slender palm, stood but a day;
all things fall and are built again
and those that build them again are gay

two chinamen, behind them a third
are carved in lapis lazuli
over them flies a long+legged bird
a symbol of longevity;
the third, doubtless a serving+man
carries a musical instrument

every discolouration of the stone
every accidental crack or dent
seems a water+course or an avalanche
or lofty slope where it still snows
though doubtless plum or cherry+branch
sweetens the little half+way house
those chinamen climb towards, and i
delight to imagine them seated there;
there, on the mountain and the sky
on all the tragic scene they stare
one asks for mournful melodies;
accomplished fingers begin to play
their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes
their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay

- cyril cusack lyrics

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