Clockwork Angels: The Novel (37 page)

Under the gaze of the angels

A spectacle like he’s never seen

Spinning lights and faces

Demon music and gypsy queens

The glint of iron wheels

Bodies spin in a clockwork dance

The smell of flint and steel

A wheel of fate, a game of chance

How I prayed just to get away

To carry me anywhere

Sometimes the angels punish us

By answering our prayers

A face of naked evil

Turns the young boy’s blood to ice

Deadly confrontation

Such a dangerous device

Shout to warn the crowd

Accusations ringing loud

A ticking box, in the hand of the innocent

The angry crowd moves toward him with bad intent

What did I see?

Fool that I was

A goddess, with wings on her heels 

All my illusions

Projected on her

The ideal, that I wanted to see

What did I know?

Fool that I was

Little by little, I learned

My friends were dismayed

To see me betrayed

But they knew they could never tell me

What did I care?

Fool that I was

Little by little, I burned

Maybe sometimes

There might be a flaw

But how pretty the picture was back then

What did I do?

Fool that I was

To profit from youthful mistakes? 

It’s shameful to tell

How often I fell

In love with illusions again

So shameful to tell

Just how often I fell

In love with illusions again

A goddess with wings on her heels . . .

A man can lose his past, in a country like this

Wandering aimless

Parched and nameless

A man could lose his way, in a country like this

Canyons and cactus

Endless and trackless

Searching through a grim eternity

Sculptured by a prehistoric sea

Seven Cities of Gold

The breakers roar on an unseen shore

In the teeth of a hurricane

We struggle in vain

A hellish night—a ghostly light

Appears through the driving rain

Salvation in a human chain

All I know is that sometimes you have to be wary, Of a miracle too good to be true

All I know is that sometimes the truth is contrary, Everything in life you thought you knew

All I know is that sometimes you have to be wary, Of a miracle too good to be true

All I know is that sometimes you have to be wary, ’Cause sometimes the target is you

Driven aground, with that awful sound

Drowned by the cheer from ashore

We wonder what for

The people swarm through the darkling storm 

Gather everything they can score

’Til their backs won’t bear any more

The breakers roar on an unseen shore

In the teeth of an icy grave

The human chain leaves a bloody stain

Washed away in the pounding waves

All I know is that memory can be too much to carry

Striking down like a bolt from the blue

All the journeys

Of this great adventure

It didn’t always feel that way

I wouldn’t trade them

Because I made them

The best I could

And that’s enough to say

Some days were dark

I wish that I could live it all again

Some nights were bright 

I wish that I could live it all again

All the highlights of that headlong flight

Holding on with all my might

To what I felt back then

I wish that I could live it all again

I have stoked the fire on the big steel wheels

Steered the airships right across the stars

I learned to fight, I learned to love and learned to feel

Oh, I wish that I could live it all again

All the treasures

The gold and glory

It didn’t always feel that way

I don’t regret it I never forget it

I wouldn’t trade tomorrow for today

I learned to fight and learned to love and learned to steal

I wish that I could live it all again

Abandoned me somehow

Belief has failed me now

Life goes from bad to worse

No philosophy consoles me

In a clockwork universe

Life goes from bad to worse

I still choose to live

Find a measure of love and laughter

And another measure to give

I still choose to live

And give, even while I grieve

Though the balance tilts against me I was brought up to believe