At night, this mindless army,
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ranks unbroken by dissent,
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is moved into action
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and their pace does not relent.
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In step, with great precision,
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these dancers of the night
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advance against the darkness -
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how implacable their might!
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Eyes undulled by moon,
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their arms and legs akimbo,
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they walk and live,
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hoping soon to surface from this limbo.
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Their minds, anticipating the dawn of the day,
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shall never know what's waiting mere insight away
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- too far, too soon.
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Senses dimmed in semi-sentience,
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only wheeling
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through this plane,
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only seeing fragmented images prematurely
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curtailed by the brain,
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but breathing, living,
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knowing in some measure at least
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the soul which roots the matter
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of both Beauty and the Beast.
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From what tooth or claw does murder spring,
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from what flesh and blood does passion?
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Both cut through the air with the pendulum's swing
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in deadly but delicate fashion.
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And every range of feeling is there in the dream
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and every logic's reeling in the force of the scream
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the senses sting.
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And though I may be dreaming and reality stalls
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I only know the meaning of sight and that's all
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and that's nothing.
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The columns of the night advance,
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infectiously, their cryptic dance
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gathers converts to the fold -
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in time the whole raw world will pace
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these same steps
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on into the same bitter end.
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Somnolent muster now the dancing dead
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forsake the shelter of their secure beds,
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awaken to a slumber whose depths they dread,
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as if the ground they tread would give way
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beneath the solemn weight of their conception.
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I'd search the hidden corners of all this world,
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make reason of the sensory whorl
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if I only had time,
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but soon the dream is ended.
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Tonight, before you lay down
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to the sweetness of your sleep
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do you question your surrender
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to the drop from Lover's Leap
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or does the anaesthetic darkness
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take hold on its very own?
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Does your body rise in service
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with not one dissenting groan?
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These waking dreams of life and death
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in the mirror are twisted and buckled,
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lashes flicker, a catch of breath,
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skin whitening at the knuckles.
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The army of sleepwalkers shake their limbs
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and are loose
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and though I am a talker, I can phrase no excuse
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not to rise again.
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In the chorus of the night-time I belong
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and I, like you, must dance to that moonlight song
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and in the end I too must pay the cost
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of this life.
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If all is lost none is known
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and how could we lose what we've never owned?
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Oh, I'd search out every knowledge
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that I could find,
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unravel all the mysteries of mind,
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if I only had time,
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if I only had time,
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but soon my time is ended.
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The Sleepwalkers
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Van Der Graaf Generator |