[Verse 1]

Round and round the berry bough

We trace the chalk with careful mouths

Paper hands and waxen crowns

All the little doors are down

In the state of snow and stone

They carved a law in marrow bone

A sealed decree, a midnight page

A hungry seal, a hidden cage

[Pre-Chorus]

Something old begins to grin

Underneath the skin again

Something green behind the eyes

Learns to bloom where reason dies

[Chorus]

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way, in mulberry shades

This is the way we kill the babes

And say the lie, and call it grace

Round and round the fruit-black loop

We sing it soft, we sing it soon (we sing it soon)

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way

[Verse 2]

Massachusetts on the slate

Wrote the room with iron hate

And every word went dressed in lace

To hide the knife behind its face

Needles in a chapel jar

Comet ash and broken stars

A mother moth, a butchered bloom

A cradle full of empty room

[Pre-Chorus]

Hear the little iron hymn

Turning under glass and brim

Hear the silence, hear it ring

Like a thorned and polished thing

[Chorus]

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way, in mulberry shades

This is the way we kill the babes

And say the lie, and call it grace

Round and round the fruit-black loop

We sing it soft, we sing it soon (we sing it soon)

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way

[Bridge]

[Long Strange Solo]

Bowed violins saw through the dark

A contrabass drags a coffin spark

Synths coil low like black glass snakes

Choir fragments split and separate

Timpani rolls like distant drums

A cathedral of rust undone

Notes bend thin, then split apart

Like paper birds with iron hearts

A horn line moans, then disappears

Through vaulted fog and leaking years

The melody turns inside out

A mirror swallowing its own mouth

One long cry, one circling thread

One silver wound, one word unsaid

Then a pause

Then a pulse

Then the strings return in shudders

[Chorus]

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way, in mulberry shades

This is the way we kill the babes

And say the lie, and call it grace

Round and round the fruit-black loop

We sing it soft, we sing it soon (we sing it soon)

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way

[Outro]

Round and round

The berry bough

Round and round

The verdict now

This is the way we kill the babes

This is the way the garden frays

This is the way we kill the babes

And leave the moon in paper chains

For my son, Dmitri Durham Bell~ 

From the poetry of Ronald Allen Bell~ 

From the mind of a madman~

Time to kick off the football season! 

[Verse 1] On a cold church floor Her hands went tight The candles bent Like they feared the light The village spoke In a lowered tone And every door Seemed to know her name [Pre-Chorus] They said a prayer Then said another The room went still Like a held-back shiver I watched the faces Stare at the frame Like something was missing But nothing changed [Chorus] Legion, Legion Heavy in the room Legion, Legion Carried out too soon I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven (Oh, Anneliese) [Verse 2] The winter came And stayed for days Boots on the stairs And the same gray haze The doctors wrote Their careful lines While her mother wept Through the kitchen blind [Pre-Chorus] And all that fear Kept getting louder Faith and blame Sat side by side there If there was a war It lived in the air A name on the lips And nowhere to go [Chorus] Legion, Legion Heavy in the room Legion, Legion Carried out too soon I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven (Oh, Anneliese) [Bridge] Some nights I think Of the final plea The way the dark Can borrow your knees If mercy came Would it come like rain Or just one small hand On the windowpane [Final Chorus] Legion, Legion Heavy in the room Legion, Legion Carried out too soon I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven I wonder what she' doing up in Heaven (Oh, Anneliese) Legion, Legion

[Verse 1] Ash in the palace throat Smoke on the lion seal Torches bite the tapestry Kings kneel into steel Black salt on the altar stone Horns in the courtyard air Blood runs under broken gates No mercy left to spare [Pre-Chorus] Hear the old names crack Hear the towers lean The vow turns to dust In a furnace unseen [Chorus] Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold [Verse 2] Priests with split-red hands Drag relics through the mire Dogs feast on the banner edge And spit out the fire Wolves in the wine-dark vault Gnaw at the oath-worn bone Every prayer comes back as rot Every crown, a stone [Pre-Chorus] Hear the old names crack Hear the towers lean The vow turns to dust In a furnace unseen [Chorus] Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold [Bridge] I watched the moon go blind Over cinders and ruin I heard the desert sing With a thousand mouths chewing Now the serpent in the ash Has a kingdom to own And the last torch dies In a hall of bone [Solo Break] [Final Chorus] Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold Burning of Persia, the devil took hold Evil inertia, the faithless they fold

From the poetry of Ronald Allen Bell~ 

From the poetry of Ronald Bell~ 

Sarah kneels before his grave and tears fall from her eyes

the sun it wakes her paralyzed

the branches hold long drooping leaves of blue as were her eyes

From the poetry of Ronald Bell~