Andy, your generosity has always been a class act around here, thank you very much for the sleeve. A couple of favs by Peter Gabriel, another wordsmith I enjoy.
Family Snapshot
The streets are lined with camera crews
Everywhere he goes is news
Today is different
Today is not the same
Today I make the action
Take snapshot into the light, snapshot into the light
I'm shooting into the light
Four miles down the cavalcade moves on
Driving into the sun
If I worked it out right
They won't see me or the gun
Two miles to go, they're clearing the road
The cheering has really begun
I've got my radio
I can hear what's going on
I've been waiting for this
I have been waiting for this
All you people in TV land
I will wake up your empty shells
Peak-time viewing blown in a flash
As I burn into your memory cells
'cause I'm alive
They're coming 'round the corner with the bikers at the front
I'm wiping the sweat from my eyes
It's a matter of time
It's a matter of will
And the governor's car is not far behind
He's not the one I've got in mind
'cause there he is-the man of the hour, standing in the limousine
"I don't really hate you
I don't care what you do
We were made for each other
Me and you
I want to be somebody
You were like that too
If you don't get given you learn to take
And I will take you."
Holding my breath
Release the catch
And I let the bullet fly
All turned quiet I have been here before
Lonely boy hiding behind the front door
Friends have all gone home
There's my toy gun on the floor
Come back Mum and Dad
You're growing apart
You know that I'm growing up sad
I need some attention
I shoot into the light
The Family and the Fishing Net
Suffocated by mirrors, stained by dreams
Her honey belly pulls the seams
Curves are stiff upon the hinge
Pale zeros tinge the tiger skin
Moist as grass, ripe and heavy as the night
The sponge is full, well out of sight
All around the conversations
Icing on the warm flesh cake
Light creeps through her secret tunnels
Sucked into the open spaces
Burning out in sudden flashes
Draining blood from well-fed faces
Desires form in subtle whispers
Flex the muscles in denial
Up and down its pristine cage
So the music, so the trial
Vows of sacrifice, headless chickens
Dance in circles, they the blessed
Man and wife, undressed by all
Their grafted trunks in heat possessed
Even as the soft skins tingle
They mingle with the homeless mother
Who loves the day but lives another
That once was hers
The worried father, long lost lover
Brushes ashes with his broom
Rehearses jokes to fly and hover
Bursting over the bride and groom
And the talk goes on
Memories crash on tireless waves
The lifeguards whom the winter saves
Silence falls the guillotine
All the doors are shut
Nervous hands grip tight the knife
In the darkness, till the cake is cut
Passed around, in little pieces
The body and the flesh
The family and the fishing-net
And another in the mesh
The body and the flesh