Voice of
the Ancetral Shrew -
Ron Perrone I wrote the poem to this my final
year in college
(1990) but didn't put it to music until a few years later when, after
an accident with a log splitter left me without a functional thumb
for a month, I had to do SOMETHING with only 1 hand. It was
inspired by the
frustratingly simple-minded attitudes of many of my fellow students at
WVU. The quote that set me off was a coversation that went something
like this.
Environmentalist, "You can't do that, its just WRONG!" Business Major, "But its legal!". Environmetalist, "But its immoral!" Business Major, "But, its legal." (With a nod to King Crimson) Back to the list |
Lyrics My dear Cenozoic chidren Iit seems to that lately, you' have been sleeping the day down Are you doing the right thing? Or are you merely getting stoned off the smoke Of a blazing empire in decline But I see that you have been counting the lights In the midnight concrete sky Those retinal flares that mark The accepted and civilized choice For synaptic self-immolation I rust that you have been evading the autoclave law And its attendant reptilian bites on the scalp and throat As for myself, well I have been hiding In a grey crevasse, transcendant On a landscape that is immutable A habitat safe for cows In the starless and bible black of contemporary annonimity It would serve you well to seek out those crepuscular haunts For the last tangled ring of ageless limbs and roots For there stands the Old Guard, though weary and ax-bitten They are still holding the high ground Holding the clean sweet earth And awaiting the onslaught finale For this is an honorable place As any to which you may aspire When migration ends on a landscape rendered sterile Safe now for cows and for swine All basking and lowing Ah, sleek and unknowing Huddled in their thousand points of precious light |