The Undercover Man

Here at the glass - 

all the usual problems, all the habitual farce.

You ask, in uncertain voice, 

what you should do,

as if there were a choice but to carry on 

miming the song

and hope that it all works out right.



Tonight it all seems so strange -

my spirit feels rigid, my body deranged;

still that's only from one point of view

and we can't have illusion between me and you,

my constant friend, ever close at hand -

you and the undercover man.



I reflect: 

'It's very strange to be going through this change

with no idea of what it's all been about

except in the context of time....'

Oh, but I shirk it, I've half a mind not to work it all out.

Is this madness just the recurring wave of total emotion,

or a hide for the undercover man,

or a litany - all the signs are there of fervent devotion -

or the cracking of the dam?



It's cracked; smashed and bursting over you,

there was no reason to expect such disaster.

Now, panicking, you burst for air,

drowning, you know you care

for nothing and no-one but yourself

and would deny even this hand 

which stretches out towards you to help.

But would I leave you in this moment of your trial?

Is it my fault that I'm here to see you crying?

These phantom figures all around you should have told you,

you should have found out by now,

if you hadn't gone and tried to do it all by yourself.



Even now we are not lost: 

if you look out at the night

you'll see the colours and the lights 

seem to say people are not far away, 

at least in distance,

and it's only our own dumb resistance

that's making us stay.

When the madness comes 

let it flood on down and over me sweetly,

let it drown the parts of me weak and blessed and damned,

let it slake my life, let it take my soul and living completely,

let it be who I am.



There may not be time for us all to run in tandem together -

the horizon calls with its parallel lines.

It may not be right for you to have and hold in one way forever

and yet you still have time,

you still have time.