A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers lyrics

I. Eyewitness

Still waiting for my saviour,

storms tear me limb from limb;

my fingers feel like seaweed...

I'm so far out I'm too far in.

I am a lonely man, my solitude is true,

my eyes have borne stark witness

and now my nights are numbered, too.

I've seen the smiles on dead hands,

the stars shine, but they're not for me.

I prophesy disaster and then I count the cost....

I shine but, shining, dying,

I know that I am almost lost.

On the table lies blank paper

and my tower is built on stone;

I only have blunt scissors,

I only have the bluntest home.

I've been the witness and the seal of death

lingers in the molten wax that is my head.

When you see the skeletons

of sailing-ship spars sinking low

you'll begin to wonder if the points of all the ancient myths

are solemnly directed straight at you...

II. Pictures / Lighthouse

(Eddies / rocks / ships / collision / remorse.)

III. Eyewitness

No time now for contrition,

the time for that's long past,

the walls are thin as tissue

and if I talk I'll crack the glass.

So I only think on how it might have been,

locked in silent monologue, in silent scream.

Anyway, I'm much too tired to speak

and, as the waves crash on the bleak

stones of the tower, I start to freak

and find that I am overcome...

IV. S.H.M.

'Unreal, unreal!' ghost helmsmen scream

and fall in through the sky,

not breaking through my seagull shrieks,

no breaks until I die.

The spectres scratch on window-slits,

the hollowed faces, mindless grins

are only intent on destroying what they've lost.

I crawl the wall till steepness ends in the vertical fall;

my pail has sailed into the sea - no joking hopes at dawn.

White bone shine in the iron-jaw mask,

lost mastheads pierce the freezing dark

and parallel my isolated tower....

no paraffin for the flame,

no harbour left to gain.

V. The Presence of the Night / Kosmos Tours

'Alone, alone, ' the ghosts all call,

pinpoint me in the light.

The only life I feel at all

is the presence of the night.

Would you cry if I died?

Would you cry if I died?

Would you catch the final words of mine?

Would you catch my words?

I know that there's no time,

I know that there's no rhyme,

false signs find me.

I don't want to hate, I just want to grow;

why can't I let me live and be free?

...but I die very slowly alone.

I know no more ways, I am so afraid,

myself won't let me just be myself

and so I am completely alone.

The maelstrom of my memory

is a vampire and it feeds on me;

now, staggering madly, over the brink I fall.

VI. (Custard's) Last Stand

Lighthouses might house the key,

but can I reach the door?

I want to walk on the sea,

so that I may better find a shore...

but how can I ever keep my feet dry?

I scan the horizon,

I must keep my eyes on all parts of me.

Looking back on the years

it seems that I have lost my way:

Like a dog in the night I have run to a manger,

now I am the stranger I stay in.

All of the grief I have seen

leaves me chasing solitary peace;

but I hold experience in my head....

I'm too close to the light

I don't think I see right, for I blind me.

VII. The Clot Thickens

Where is the God that guides my hand?

How can the hands of others reach me?

When will I find what I grope for?

Who is going to teach me?

I am me / me are we / we can't see

any way out of here.

Crashing sea, a atrophied history:

Chance has lost my Guinevere....

I don't want to be one wave in the water,

But sea will drag me deep:

one more haggard drowned man.

I can see the Lemmings coming,

but I know I'm just a man;

Do I join or do I founder?

Which can is the best I may?

VII. Land's End (Sineline)/We Go Now

Oceans drifting sideways, I am pulled into the spell,

I feel you around me...I know you well.

Stars slice horizons where the lines stand much too stark;

I feel I am drowning - hands stretch in the dark.

Camps of panoply and majesty, what is Freedom of Choice?

Where do I stand in the pageantry...whose is my voice?

It doesn't feel so very bad now, I think the end is the start,

begin to feel very glad now:

All things are a part

All things are apart

All things are a part

• Artist:Van Der Graaf Generator
• Album:Pawn Hearts