This will always be, in my opinion one of the greatest songs ever written. The lyrics alone just in this one song are comparable to some of the best poets of all time. Literally made my wig FLY the first time I ever heard this and continues to.
100% agreed. This whole record is an absolute top level master class in poetry, symbolism, metaphors, allegory, & music composition, production, & mixing. There exists no other recording artist who can bring me to tears every single time I listen to their work. Joanna does it every single time.
I could live a 1000 years and never write something as incredible as this song and it is only one of five miracles from the album. like, what the hell, how are we the same species?
Awful, atol! O incalculable! Indiscreetness and sorrow, bawl, bellow. Sybil sea-cow all done up in a bow. Toddle and roll, teethe an impalpable bit of leather while yarrow, heather and hollyhock awkwardly molt along the shore. The best part!!!
And there was a booming above you That night, black airplanes flew over the sea And they were lowing and shifting like Beached whales Shelled snails As you strained and you squinted to see The retreat of their hairless and blind cavalry You froze in your sand shoal Prayed for your poor soul Sky was a bread roll, soaking in a milk-bowl And when the bread broke, fell in bricks of wet smoke My sleeping heart woke, and my waking heart spoke And there was a silence you took to mean something Run, sing For alive you will evermore be And the plague of the greasy black engines a-skulkin' Has gone east While you're left to explain them to me Released from their hairless and blind cavalry With your hands in your pockets, stubbily running To where I'm unfresh, undressed and yawning Well, what is this craziness? This crazy talking? You caught some small death when you were sleepwalking It was a dark dream, darlin', it's over The firebreather is beneath the clover Beneath his breathing there is cold clay, forever A toothless hound-dog choking on a feather But I took my fishingpole, fearing your fever Down to the swimminghole, where there grows bitter herb That blooms but one day a year by the riverside, I'd bring it here Apply it gently To the love you've lent me While the river was twisting and braiding, the bait bobbed And the string sobbed, as it cut through the hustling breeze And I watched how the water was kneading so neatly Gone treacly Nearly slowed to a stop in this heat In a frenzy coiling flush along the muscles beneath Press on me, we are restless things Webs of seaweed are swaddling And you call upon the dusk Of the musk of a squid Shot full of ink, until you sink into your crib Rowing along, among the reeds, among the rushes I heard your song, before my heart had time to hush it! Smell of a stone fruit being cut and being opened Smell of a low and of a lazy cinder smoking And when the fire moves away Fire moves away, son Why would you say I was the last one? Scrape your knee, it is only skin Makes the sound of violins And when I cut your hair, and leave the birds all of the trimmings I am the happiest woman among all women And the shallow Water Stretches as far as I can see Knee-deep, trudging along The seagull weeps "so long" Humming a threshing song Until the night is over Hold on! Hold on! Hold your horses back from the fickle dawn I have got some business out at the edge of town Candy weighing both of my pockets down 'Til I can hardly stay afloat, from the weight of them And knowing how the common-folk condemn What it is I do, to you, to keep you warm Being a woman, being a woman But always up the mountainside you're clambering Groping blindly, hungry for anything Picking through your pocket linings, well, what is this? Scrap of sassafras, eh Sisyphus? I see the blossoms broke and wet after the rain Little sister, he will be back again I have washed a thousand spiders down the drain Spiders ghosts hang soaked and dangelin' Silently from all the blooming cherry trees In tiny nooses, safe from everyone Nothing but a nuisance gone now, dead and done Be a woman, be a woman Though we felt the spray of the waves We decided to stay till the tide rose too far We weren't afraid, 'cause we know what you are And you know that we know what you are Awful atoll Oh, incalculable indiscreetness and sorrow Bawl, bellow Sibyl sea-cow, all done up in a bow Toddle and roll Teeth an impalpable bit of leather While yarrow, heather and hollyhock Awkwardly molt along the shore Are you mine? My heart? Mine anymore? Stay with me for awhile That's an awfully real gun I know life will lay you down As the lightning has lately done Failing this, failing this Follow me, my sweetest friend To see what you anointed in pointing your gun there Lay it down, nice and slow There is nowhere to go, save up Up where the light, undiluted, is weaving in a drunk dream At the sight of my baby, out back Back on the patio watching the bats bring night in While, elsewhere, estuaries of wax-white Wend, endlessly, towards seashores unmapped Last week our picture window produced a half-word Heavy and hollow, hit by a brown bird We stood and watched her gape like a rattlesnake And paint and labour over every intake I said a sort of prayer for some sort of rare grace Then thought I ought to take her to a higher place Said "dog nor vulture nor cat shall toy with you And though you die, bird, you will have a fine view" Then in my hot hand She slumped her sick weight We tramped through the poison oak Heartbroke and inchoate The dogs were snapping And you cuffed their collars While I climbed the tree-house Then how I hollered Well, she'd lain, as still as a stone, in my palm, for a lifetime or two Then, saw the treetops, cocked her head and up and flew While, back in the world that moves, often According to the hoarding of these clues Dogs still run roughly around Little tufts of finch-down And the cities we passed were a flickering wasteland But his hand in my hand made them hale and harmless While down in the lowlands the crops are all coming We have everything Life is thundering blissful towards death In a stampede of his fumbling green gentleness You stopped by, I was all alive In my doorway, we shucked and jived And when you wept, I was gone See, I got gone when I got wise But I can't with certainty say we survived Then down, and down And down, and down And down, and deeper Stoke without sound The blameless flames You endless sleeper Through fire below, and fire above, and fire within Sleeped through the things that couldn't have been if you hadn't have been And when the fire moves away Fire moves away, son And why would you say I was the last one? All my bones they are gone, gone, gone Take my bones, I don't need none Cold, cold cupboard, lord, nothing to chew on Suck all day on a cherry stone Dig a little hole, not three inches round Spit your pit in a hole in the ground Weep upon the spot for the starving of me 'Till up grow a fine young cherry tree Well when the bough breaks, what'll you make for me? A little willow cabin to rest on your knee What'll I do with a trinket such as this? Think of your woman, who's gone to the west But I'm starving and freezing in my measly old bed Then I'll crawl across the salt flats to stroke your sweet head Come across the desert with no shoes on I love you truly, or I love no one Fire moves away Fire moves away, son Why would you say That I was the last one Last one Clear the room! There's a fire, a fire, a fire Get going, and I'm going to be right behind you And if the love of a woman or two, dear Couldn't move you to such heights, then all I can do Is do, my darling, right by you
This is the only song that really matters to me.... All the others? Nahh... This is the song that makes sense to my person. When I'm an old man in an old folks home I hope that some underpaid nurse thinks to put this song on my headphones.... I'll be happy then.
@@thomasc7379 I'm pretty sure it was meant in a supporting and nicest way possible. Aknowledging nurses are underapreciated, overworked, hoping they still be able to put on the headphones of the old people. Cut eachother some slack, it's to easy to go to war for misunderstandings. While in truth we want the same.
I was so excited when I first heard this track and noticed Bill Callahan doing vocals on it. I think it's natural that two great folk artists work so well together
I'm personally very careful with this song. It's without a doubt the most powerful and well written song I've ever heard in my entire life and could be the best one I will ever hear. I shiver every time and hear it and tear up 70% of the time so I only listen to it when I feel I need to be vulnerable. It's like a supplement to help me effectively go through a cathartic moment if that makes sense. Thank you, Joanna Newsom. I'm full grown man who doesn't ever idolize celebrities, but if I saw her in real life I would literally fall to the ground crying.
I’m a rapper And she gives me so much peace ☮️ as a grown man and breaks my heart for me when I want to but I’ve become too hardened by the world I would love to compose a song with her to show her my range it wouldn’t even be rap but in a way she’s as lyrical as a rapper but has sooo much more soul and is honestly the truth I feel so out of place for finding peace in her voice because it’s outside of the norm but I march to the best of my own drum 🥁
"use the song carefully" You understand. It's to be used with great care. I know how beautiful it is, but it also makes me feel like I'm going to die soon--as we all are. Use with care.
Some Years ago, I had a terrible cold. I was laying in the in the sun and listened to Only Skin and Emily. While I listened, I was shivering the whole time. After that I stood up and my cold was completely blown away. Like a miracle.
your account is infinitely interesting to me! i believe something big takes place when our bodies shiver and shake. it seems to me this music helped you unleash some great protective power within, a call for life. i love joanna's music and i loved hearing your account, thanks for sharing!
<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="815">13:35</a> - <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="926">15:26</a> : Oh, such Magnificence... Such Crescendo... Gives me **CHILLS** every single time.
i'm getting more breugel the elder vibes honestly, with folk themes as seen by an intellectual it has bosch's elegance, but not much of his macabre atmosphere
not trying to nitpick or go to great lengths just to find hidden secrets or anything, it's just occurred to me: "Come across the desert with no shoes on" seems to answer the question poised in Go Long: "Do you know why my ankles are bound in gauze?" i just always wondered why were the narrator's ankles the only ones bound in gauze when they both danced in the lodge...
Comme la première lumière du crépuscule, cette femme artiste nous ouvre les yeux à de vieilles promesses et à toutes les anomalies bienfaisantes de la nature. Evocatrices de pouvoirs au-delà de l'observation, sa musique tire les ficelles du cœur, attire les nostalgies et réveille les tourbillons, les vies écorchés et la torpeur des veilleurs tourmentés.
You saved my friend, this song helped him he was poisoned from alcohol and from singing this for 12 mins he threwwww up and got the shit out of his system and survived
Awful atoll - O, incalculable indiscreetness and sorrow! Bawl bellow: Sibyl sea-cow, all done up in a bow. Toddle and roll; teethe an impalpable bit of leather, while yarrow, heather and hollyhock awkwardly molt along the shore.
<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="633">10:33</a>, “wearing a diaper, you will have a fine view” was actually “and though you’d die, bird, you will have a fine view”
Rabbit, my sister, study this song for as long as it takes you know the part I love. You’ll feel it. Bury me in candlelight! You’ll feel the candle light. Don’t fear where you bury me if you feel it too, Make sure you’ve stared at that old hag in the mirror She is an old hag, by the way Don’t get lost by the hairless blind Calvary.
What exactly this song is talking about? I dont know why but sometimes I listen to it and cant avoid toconnect it with a "dark souls" vibe, like a corpse forming again into life.
