The flowers by your bed are wilting The sun is setting in the west A fog is covering your eyes Your stockings are attracting flies Decay is nibbling at the boards on which you rest
There's someone waiting at your window Familiar face without a name One night he'll creep in like the mist To touch your forehead with a kiss And lead you back into the void from whence you came
We've all begun to die, and don't know what to do Since it hurts to pray to God, when God is dying too Takes strength to laugh, when you start to drown And we dance while the sky crashes down
Like that the earth begins to quiver And all the oceans turn to black A ship of maniacs with knives Are playing Blackjack with their lives To kill the time until the giant rats attack
It's raining leprosy and acid The saints were taken out and shot When someone proffers you a pear You sink your teeth in unaware That just beneath the skin lies pestilence and rot
All that now breathes, and all that you love All that we weave, will find its way back to the dust
A band of skeletons is playing Don't act like you don't know the tune Your part is echoed in the path Of every dead leaf blowing past Against a counterpoint reflected off the moon
There is a banquet at the table Exotic cheeses wines and cakes And every one of us is damned Until we start to understand That living is to gorge ourselves at our own wakes
When the stakes are high, best to play the clown And we dance while the sky crashes down