THE TRUTH LIES THEREIN

He shall be taken with out the walls of the city
where pestilence shall hold dominion over all
the water will stink and prove bitter on his tongue
a plague of isolation shall deliver him to decrepitude
wither shall he fly in such misery
he wants to run
where can he run?
it's blood uptown and blood downtown
blood in the woods and blood in the country
he will crawl like a raving dog starving with a hunger
but the will therein lieth, which does not die
who knows the mysteries of the will with its vigour
for a body is but a great will pervading all things by nature of its intent
man does not yield himself to the angels
nor unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will

man does not yield himself to the angels
nor unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will

the sky shall vanish and he shall enter the empire of the Lord
through the silent labyrinth of death to the echoing chambers of paradise
in blue serene opalescence live the innocent
and goodness lives forever
like the odor of nude flowers in the sense of every spirit who lives therein
where numberless ranks of angels draped in feeble robes that hang like gold leaf is about each celestial frame
Angels who sing as with one voice the fabulous music of the spheres
in the fathomless precincts of eternity she reigns
immaculate in flames of pale blue mystery
her frail features radiant with some extra lunar incandescence
the mystic rose in whose blemishing grace he shall come to know the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God.

LYRICS © JOHN COOPER CLARKE