released January 13, 2024

All songs written, performed and recorded by Chris Inman.

Born was I not yesterday. I did not float up the Bann in a bubble. Pay the piper or the rats return. All the fat cats are gonna need feeding. When the birds above your head. Refuse to sing or peck your bread. And the books which you've never read. Torment you for the life you've led. Don't sell me down the river. Don't hang me out to dry. Clap your hands, bang your pots and pans. Because we're all in this together. Run and hide while you're still alive. Now you're part of the propaganda.

If you pray for my redemption. Should it fall upon deaf ears. Entertain my good intentions and bear my soul to auctioneers. And in my hour of dying, black angels come for me. Place the pennies on my eyes. Not do I wish to see. Within the seventh circle, thorns adorn my tree. Yet the harpies bring no mercy and forever torment me.

I saw Kubrick in orbit in Hollywood hills. The meaning of life on a one dollar bill. I saw the belt of Orion align with us all. While sleeping Antarctica harboured its haul. There was debris in Roswell and reptilian kings. Chemtrails above us, and ‘vaccines’ within. I saw Plato’s Atlantis and the Vatican gold. Follow me down the rabbit hole. I saw Richie in Goa and Cobain’s last stand. I held the Voynich manuscript in the palm of my hand.

If all we have is fleeting momentary glimpses of clarity, rather than yearning, beckoning, summoning, gesturing, become conscious of now. If time were a melody, a steadfast calamity, a sonata in G, the dance we’ve performed since the day we were born is formless and free. Before the brushstrokes descended, the artist amended, updated, reamended, reupdated, refixated, readjusted, reconverted, readapted, recorrected, undeleted, uncompleted, unrestarted, configurated, reaborted, unrepeated, unremoulded.

Handmedown holes in handmedown clothes, Handmedown ribbons in handmedown bows, Handmedown hopes and handmedown dreams, Handmedown hearts and handmedown sleeves. Behind a wall of fine valour, Oh what she had endured. No time for dignity. Forced beauty pageantry. “You may take these rags and parade me in the street, I’m the accessory to the shoes upon your feet, I’m your creation, your Michelangelo, Is your love enclosed in buttons and in bows?” Handmedown traits and handmedown fears, Handmedown truth and handmedown tears, Handmedown smiles and handmedown hugs, Handmedown toys and handmedown love.

The raindrops on your window wait patiently, earnestly. To hear a faint crescendo. A laboured sigh. An alibi. The womb of your renascence. A metamorphosis. A chrysalis. Your self imposing exile, to shed your skin. And emerge again. And do you have men who bring you wine? Who furnish you with posy in death and decline. And do you pretend that everything’s fine? Just before you lift the lids of your eyes. The raindrops on your window fell gradually, eventually. Arpeggio, staccato. What became of thee, Emily?

In the bleak midwinter of my mind, waves joust between us, I am blind. Faceless porcelain angels, dance in unison to Tchaikovsky’s tambourine and Stravinsky’s drum machine.