And you can see where the trees were, A tiny scrap in the outskirts. And you can just about recall the birdsong, Seems so strange that it can’t be right. And you could see from the hill, oh, If there were a hill, The whole damn edifice. Every circle’s made up of infinite points, There ain’t no inside out. And at the centre of the town’s centrifugal tumult, Driven up like a nail through the calcified mantle, Shadow counting out the turns of the universe around it, There ain’t no out. There ain’t no out. And we will shiver in our skin And wait. There ain’t no out.

I spread my wings from the swamplands To the top of the hill. I’m the force of the trailing push Behind gravity’s pull. They built a temple to fete me At the city’s cold core. You’ll find my blood from the home’s hearth To the tip of the oar. But I— I’m nothing at all Sitting firm in your hand Like the heart of a hole. And I— I will sit there and grow. Yeah you know how I am, And you know how it goes. The still of the dark The waves at the shore The skip in your heart The light on your wall I’m the noumenon severed Crying out at your door, Frozen fingers grasping stiff At the phenomenal cord. I’m the pace of the stopped clock, Rushing by you like tar. I will wait out your dying sun And the following dark. But I— I’m nothing at all Riding high on your back Like the weight of a hole. And I— I will sit there and grow. Yeah you know how I am, And you know how it goes. The still of the dark The waves at the shore The skip in your heart The light on your wall The din of the dark The light on your wall The din of your heart The light on your wall I’m drinking deep of your black bile, Catch your sediment to build my spine, oh, I’ll swing from your ribs and kick, All tapping out the seconds like a pebble down a well. I cut my teeth suckin’ blood from stones, Don’t start with your tree trunk rind. Try to smother me and oh, I’ll extrude through the fists every time. How you wanna be prefigured? How you wanna be mourned? How you wanna be cut in the tablet? How you wanna be gone?

Maybe it started when our favourite bars turned into bougie garbage Or when every single anchor line went slack. We had it in our heads that change like this required bloody carnage But we cut our own damn throats behind our backs. 'Cause they didn't come with weapons but with theories of production, And the gleam of our ambition cast in plastic on a plinth, And a tempting way of thinking of our hungry side as some innate instruction, And a way to think you're floating when you sink. Every centre was a hole, Every thing was its container. We were never good at change But we were champion complainers. And we'd surely blame the water Just for yielding to our feet, But if the drowning came on slow enough We'd swear that it was breathing. The map is accurate you simply have to find the place that matches, If you can't just dig it out of living rock. We cut channels in our faces with a million tiny scratches A little deeper every run around the clock. When we'd stripped down all the forests And we'd made the oceans sick And we'd kicked away the ladders from the great surrounding wall, Well we huddled round the tower and we turned our gazes inwards So we couldn't see the edges of our wretched selves at all. //chorus Yeah the past is all cast shadows Though the future isn’t sunny, And the punchline is a payload It was never all that funny. We weren’t making anything But we were good at making money. We could sacrifice ‘em all, It won’t bring back our god damn honey. (We could sacrifice them all, it won’t bring back our god damn honey We could sacrifice them all, and we won’t get nothing) //chorus

A bitta comfort here, a bitta cold relief, Hangin’ static in a holding pattern handed down. I recognise the play, I recognise the scene, Playin’ pilot with our feet six inches underground. And if I—, and if I— I couldn’t tell ya. And if I—, and if I— Could only cut cut cut cut it out. And I reckon I, reckon I could make it out. And I reckon I, reckon I could never make it out. And your ribs crack When you come up breathing With a red eye And a head full of shot. And I dug up And I hung there swinging Like a cat caught stealing from the fisherman. And I—, and I— I couldn’t tell ya. And I—, and I— Cannot cut cut cut cut it out And I reckon I, reckon I could make it out. And I reckon I, reckon I could never make it out. And I reckon I, reckon I could make it out. Luck and all, I reckon I will never make it out. And I reckon I, reckon I could make it out. Cat caught, I reckon I will never make it out. (A bitta comfort here, a bitta cold relief, Holdin’ static in a holding pattern handed down I recognise the play, I recognise the scene, Playin’ pilot with our feet six inches underground. Ain’t no inside out, ain’t no outside in, Start digging if you ever wanna make it out. A bitta comfort here, a bitta cold relief—)

You can only tell the seasons by the shadow on the wall and the contour that it draws as the dry light passes by the lampshade near the window — it’ll slump just by the picture-frame on a winter’s day, and in the summer it’ll rise there like the heavy slow ascent of a cargo plane that’s loaded to the walls. The days are deathless here; deathless and identical. And it’s only by matching the fog of your breath to the hands of the clock that you know where you are, as the shadow passes overhead, and the room bleeds heat like a fresh-cut vein, and your thin and threadbare skin starts to tremble. And the midnight sun metes out the day in dizzy wheeling spirals, drawing borders as it circumscribes the sky, once and then again, once and then again, once and then again— And the windows over yonder might as well be haunted mirrors; you can see yourself within them, out of time, standing stutter-stunned, grey and moribund. And you wonder do the others have some sense of satisfaction, some connection to the source you never found. Or do they seethe? Do they seethe like you do? You’ve heard tell of a tunnel shot under the centre for some oblique purpose that no-one quite knows, like getting in fresh hollow-heads to fill them up again, or to break them down; some say the brickwork starts to writhe deep inside. Others say it’s an oesophagus that winds beneath the streets, beneath the residents at windows looking out with soft dimming eyes, like server farm lights, switching on and off, on and off, on and off.

That ever-present grinding sound. Those shifting stones beneath your feet. Some titanic ruction underground, As though the mountains mean to rise. That message slipped beneath your door, That hand that looked so much like yours: ‘There are only two ways out. There’s the button or the ledge. Miles up or miles down, Face the core or scrape the sky. Remember what the bastard said: If you ain’t mad you must be dead.’ Just like you have been, Freezing from the inside. Maybe it’s time, time.

I can Never tell what you’re thinking When you scan the perimeter wall, Like you’re tryna find seams so you can look out On the great fields of nothing at all. Yeah you look like a prophet When your eyes go dusty and dim. Got that dip to your head and you act like it’s yours Though nothing here really is. I’d go back and change If I could. Find a different place If I could. Hopes thrown high and falling, Looking back up the spine of the arc, Like we could’ve been fixed in place at the acme If not for the swallowing dark. When you spit your predictions I can feel your heart skip a beat. Like we’re caracals jumping at birds flying by, Getting feathers stuck in our teeth. And you know I’d change If I could. I would keep us safe If I could. Now you’re here At the old redoubt, And it’s time And you’re freaking out, At the lip Of a wide, cold mouth. Times like these, Oh, they could swallow you whole.

A year of disappointment, Another shortly after, A sense of fading strength and The sting of wasted promise. Oh and it was cruel, The way that things unravelled, A territory lost to The reaches of the past. The ghost of cherished sentiment Rattling its chains, The thrill of something different, An unexpected pressure, A knot to untie, A skin to cast aside. Oh and you Knew him well. He was kind, You were young. You were gone For a spell, Oh and he Came undone. Got a shine To his teeth When he counts What he’s lost. Though you tried, Even you Couldn’t tell What it was. A calling at the centre, A chrysalitic tangle, The vicious architecture That moves like it is breathing, And speaks to him of power In iron superstitions; His lucky number seven His lucky number seven. If suffering is virtue Then surely he is good— A final confirmation, An enemy to conquer, A place to take back, A sacred way to die. A revanchist will have his war of reclamation come hell or high water. You and all the others, you might as well be ghosts, And it’s a violent haunting. So he keeps to himself, And he’s drawing up a plan, And you fall away like scales. Oh and you Knew him well. He was kind, You were young. You were gone For a spell, Oh and he Came undone. Got a shine To his teeth When he counts What he’s lost. Though you tried, Even you Couldn’t tell What it was. There’s a spring In his step, And a war In his head. He’s got blood On his tongue As he speaks Of a land Where his pain Can unfold And find peace With the axe. Never young, Never old, And you won’t Get him back.

Ten thousand steps in silence— You emerge like something new From the throat you fled through Oh so long ago. And here the bricks are breathing. They whisper in your voice, And speak to All your hungry doubts. But don’t stop. Be quick, don’t stop, keep running Keep your head on straight, don’t stop, they’re comin Keep your head down, quick, don’t stop, keep running Keep your head on straight, don’t stop, they’re coming It’s been such a long time. He never thought he’d find you here, But there you are on camera Running [down/up] the stairs It’s been a long time coming, Ever since you stole yourself away He swings and clips you hard. But don’t stop. //chorus At the extremities It’s all flattened out. A superimposition: The button and the ledge. So do you jump clear? Or do you bring it down? Is there a difference? You’re losing blood, now, Keep your head, be quick they’re coming, Keep your head.

Everything stops. Your ribs are bleeding heat. He’s angled like a tiger at hunt, With a hatchet in his hand. You taste blood, And see the midnight sun, A shaft that cuts a column between you. Everything stops. A terminating point In a line made up of infinite points. The walls have fallen quiet— Beneath your touch— The button’s bony shell, The drop that yawns in front of your feet, oh. Everything again; Within each turn, another; Repeats smeared together to stasis ‘Til the core is pulled to breach. Oh to step Is to let your hand come down Is to tilt over the edge and fall. The trailing push— That crushing absent weight— The prison walls of your skull, And the prospect of escape. Everything stops. This too shall pass. The fate of everything is to one day come apart. At the end of each line, another finds its start. Beyond the veil of time, a softly beating heart. And at every arrival, the promise to depart. The fate of everything is to one day come apart, And come apart.

To come apart— To build your own damn gate— And to extrude— When we dissolve we accelerate.

There ain’t no makin sense, not of this one, oh, I know you’ll try. That wild extended bedlam, then an overbearing still, Chaotic itself in some ways. That constant sun— It’s going down, down, down. And didn’t you ask for this, The collapse of the superposition? And didn’t you ask for this, The outside coming in, like you know what you want? Well now it’s here, So tell me, what comes next? You’ll scramble round for symbols from long ago, All amber-flashed. A steaming cup of coffee, and a half-smoked cigarette, A courtyard bathed in light. You’ll let them in, And they will pull your heart to bits. But shouldn’t you push for this? This painful realisation? And wasn’t it made for this? To grow and collapse underneath its astonishing weight? About damn time, It’s coming down. It’s coming down. It’s coming down like it was built to. All that iron, bone and rust Raining down around you. You’ve got a hatchet of your own, See you swing it true. You’re coming down. You’re coming down like you were meant to. Whatcha putting up? What could possibly replace you? You know that nothing’s ever old, And nothing’s ever new.