A SONG OF DESPERATION song lyrics NERUDA CODA
by Joel Sattler

[based on the coda to 20 LOVE POEMS
by Pablo Neruda]

from night surrounds your memory
the river merges tears with sea
deserted like the wharves at dawn
abandoned now I take my leave

flower heads on my heart rain
the pit the shipwrecked castaways
in you were wars and flyaways
the songbird rose up in your day

you swallowed all of it like distance
like the sea and time you turned
the happy hour of assault
the kiss that like a lighthouse burned

the pilot's dread the diver's fury
muddy drunkenness above
everything you sank within you
you shipwrecked everything I love

in the fog of childhood I
my soul was winged like a dove
and wounded lost explorer died
you shipwrecked everything I love

and still you still hung on to the pain
but still you still desired blood
the sadness fell and falls upon you
you shipwrecked everything I love

I made the shadow wall go back
I walked beyond desire and act
o flesh my flesh my woman lost
I sing the hour count the cost

like a jar you filled my heart
with a love that could not last
and infinite oblivion
shattered you like bottle glass

in the black solitude of islands
there you took me in your arms
you were the fruit of all my hunger
the miracle that did me harm

o woman how could you contain me
in the land that was your soul
on the cross that were your arms
in the heart you did enfold

my lust was terrible and brief
both drunk and wired up with grief
boneyard of kisses fiery lies
the birds peck at my burning eyes

biting kissing hungry teeth
bodies wrapped up under sheets
the crazy copulation blues
knotting up the me and you

and the sweetness dusted light
as flour or as water does
a whispered word that was my fate
you shipwrecked everything I love

you took in everything inside you
you squeezed the pain out of the ground
the waves washed up and down beside you
and in the waves you could not drown

from crest to crest you called and sang
you standing like a sailor brave
in songs you thrived you were alive
much more than all the hurt you gave

unlucky slinger pale blind diver
lost explorer of what was
discoverer now undiscovered
you shipwrecked everything I love

and now it's time to leave at last
the hard cold hour come to pass
the belt of sea girdles the shore
the stars emerge the black birds soar

abandoned like the wharves at dawn
the shadows twist my hands in tandem
now it's time that we be gone
abandoned we are both abandoned

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