flight [the margin] Lyrics – peter hammill

flight [the margin] Lyrics by peter hammill

I always forget how crazy things are
So sometimes it catches me off my guard
When they make sense
The line on the road trail the arrow in the sky

I search for the mote in my brother’s eye
Beneath the pence…
A time of blunt instruments
Still uncertain when i’ve woken

Or what constitutes a conscious mind
Though the thought remains unspoken
I know i’m flying blind
Breaking into cold sweat on the white~hot coals

The pеnnies from heaven drop through my soul:
It don’t rеlent
At the back end of dreams i’m amazed to awake…
I offer my theories but just can’t shake

That seventh sense
To which there’s no defense
Oh yes, it seemed that the time was for action
It seemed so cool to be that kind…

My tongue writhed to form some retraction
Oh, but i knew i was flying blind
I want things to be fast, down to the power~dive;
I want the zero~gravity heroes to play dead

But stay alive
I want things to be slow, all the way to stall;
We talk about a thousand things that never change at all
Oh no, it never change…

It was then that i knew i’d been thoughtless
Something had slipped my mind:
I’d strapped myself into the fortress
Oh but the fortress was flying blind

Oh we got full clearance
So someone down there ought to know
The truth of our disappearance ~
If even that still shows it accuses and blames me

But nothing was quite what it seemed
Sometimes things work out so strangely
That it might as well all be dreamed
The white cane fandango in morse code

Try to shake through the message
Shake the load;
Only venial sin, running on the spot
Till the dance begins

Upset the contango on your future stock;
Paying backwardation, hold onto what you’ve got ~
Such a sideways grin!
Some day you may need to trade that in

Where does a man go when the muscles cramp?
Try to write out a postcard on a postage stamp
With a drawing pin punching out the braille
For the whole within?

If we ride this right
The future will fall in our hands
If we survive the flight
The future will work out ~

Nothing’s that black and white
Nothing’s that black and white
Nothing’s that black and white
Nothing’s that black and white

Nothing’s that black and white
The colour~coded charts are spread
But we’re still gliding deep into the red
The radio is dead

Every valve blown open
The radar screen fl!cks monochrome
Air traffic controller wants to get on home
He is waiting for a phone call

To release him from all responsibility
N0body goes to see him any more
Except for the man from the ministry
He wanted to be, he wanted to be

The man at the helm, in command of the flightpath;
He’s flying a chair, quite beyond control;
He’s going to have just one more chance
At a barrel roll

All in a dream, all as a dream
All the colours too bright, the music too deafening ~
The black~out world has just begun to show
These cracked~out words i offer…

But i still don’t know
But i still don’t know
But i still don’t know
But i still don’t know

Cool blue suffuse the colour gun ~
Oh, come in, come in number one:
Your time’s nearly run
Speed~freeze the frame

The present and the past hold fast….
It’s too fast, oh the thing don’t
Oh the thing won’t
Oh the thing don’t last

The rolling dice clash together, never make up the score;
That old device, the ejector seat is glued to the floor
Everybody waits for everyone to make a show
No~one wants to be the first, admitting that they know

How anythings that’s gone down here
Could fit into an ~n~lytic groove
Wait for the tactical move
I only wait for some action we all can approve

Too much to drink, for the cup reaches down to the sea;
Too touch, to think, the barometer pressuring me
Rolling down the weather for an easter parade
Reeling out the maydays in the hope of being saved

But the radio ham’s out giving blood ~
Oh no, no, no, he’s not listening
The cricketer has got his “wisden”
The pilot has got his “jane’s”

The sum of this factual wisdom
Won’t help us to fly the plane
Oh but it never will…
Beneath the tartan two~piece there’s something rips undone…

Wait for the ladder to run
Wait for the snake that the ladder becomes
A passenger hits the c~ckpit, willing to chance his game:
Pulls out his gun and c~cks it

In the hope that it all might change, but it never will…
A fly~leaf from the library shows others have been here before
Tried, failed and kicked out the door;
The aircrew don’t care anymore

Now they just wait for the beat of the silk~worm wing
Wait for the heat to come down on us
Force of the law (oh)
Full force of gravity pulls me down

I’ll be better off out of there;
Aerobatic spin around
I’ll take my chances in the open air
Sycamore silk~worm wings

Or roman candle to the ground
There’s only one thing for sure:
When the balloon goes up
The aeronaut calm down

And he say nothing is quite what it seems
Oh he say nothing is quite what it seems;
But i say nothing is nothing
Softly, the angels sing their time and sp~ce refrain:

There’s something in everything if you can only pin down its name
Aerobatic thoughts at the back of my mind ~
Is it nothing but the looping line we all follow?
Nothing but the spiral twist of dna?

There’ll be no looking back from tomorrow on today
So the wire is tripped, split~seconds defect to their successors;
The umbilical cord is ripped ~
Here we all are in free fall

So i stall where i am, as if to see where i’ve been
Only running down the looping line we all follow
Only chasing down the spiral twist of dna
There can be no looking on to tomorrow from today

Oh life/death/night/day…
Cold breath will surely fly away
Is the empire of sensation locked in a black box deep in me, encoded there somehow?
It fires the imagination to fly on a wing and a prayer through my life

Oh is that how it is?
This is now
Which will be then?
Is this the means?

All i know for shure is
This is the end
Yeah, there will be no looking on to tomorrow
Yeah, better think on today
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peter hammill Lyrics – flight [the margin]

peter hammill

flight [the margin]