CURSE OF THE BORN
     

Well the wards are overflowing
Train whistle blowing
Running out of bandages tonight

Though I should be on my way
By your bed I stay
Your face it shimmers, pale and white

'Neath your eyelids as you dream
You'll be laughing in a stream
'Fore climbing up aboard a trackless train

Blowing kisses from the caboose
And my grief chokes like a noose
As I stumble blind behind, in vain

Well we're born into this world
But we can't get out alive
So we balance on a wire
And juggle cut-throat knives
Some people try to fly
While others just ask why
But all I know is, from me she's been torn
Oh, it's the curse of the born

Well she tried to explain
But I closed my brain
To the warnings of what was to come

In the moonlight she dived
While her face I memorised
And she kissed me and held me feeling numb

Are we all condemned to need
Are we all condemned to bleed
Are we all maimed and then set free?

But her train is pulling away
And I don't know what to say
Can you need someone more than the need to breathe?

Well we're born into this world
But we can't get out alive
So we invent excuses
'Bout why we should survive
Some people try to pray
And others try to pay
For a ticket on the train to dawn
Oh, it's the curse of the born

The machine stops its beep
And the nurse pulls up the sheet
I grip on to your hand like a rope

But I'm slipping off the end
As I try to comprehend
The anger, the love and the hope

[solo].

Now I'm freefalling in blue sky
And your train puffs down below
The sun lights up your carriage
I drift through the window
I melt into your arms
With a joy I've never known
You're beautiful and whole again and warm

We've escaped the curse of the born



© David Lowe 1990