Anthem Lyrics

Read all the lyrics for Anthem: Homunculus below, listed by episode.

Episode 1: “Alone”

Homunculus

I’m the mold on your bread

The prayer bruise on your head

The pause in the joke

That makes you cry til you choke

As a lover I’m unsurpassed

But I come first and you go last

No rival comes above me

I will fuck you til you love me

The end is nigh

And so am I

I am free

To be there when you die

I’ll suck on your memories

Learn from your mistakes

Curate the nightmares

That keep you awake

I will text from upstairs

Just to say you’re pretty

May you live to see

My love turn to pity

I hate when you cry

So dry your eyes

I’m so free

To be there when you die

I will eat the sins

Pressed into your flesh

I will empty and embalm

I will bathe and bless

Just upload your heartache

Onto my soft drive

We will live forever

The singularity has arrived

It’s do or die

The planet’s gonna fry

But when you say goodbye

It will still be there when you die.

I must admit my life’s been

One long bad decision

But my jail cell’s been

Carved out with precision

So spare me the bedside manner

Who says a tumor is subtle

My kingdom for a hammer

To deliver my rebuttal

Some will say I deserve this

And ain’t karma a bitch

I’m a drag on the system

Why not make room for the rich

Christians will avert their eyes

And pray to heaven above

I say, sweet Jesus

I’ll take Medicaid over your love

I don’t know why

I even try

But I’m the only one

Who will still be there when you die

I know I disgust you

I’ve discussed you in detail

With my advisors

They call me the the last great American whale

But how thin the veil

Between loneliness and being alone

I will shuck you like an oyster

I will break your fucking bones

Let’s just skip the plot

Slash the Gordian knot

If you had a body

I say let’s step outside

If I had the courage

I’d bury myself alive

I may not live forever

But you I will survive

I’m so free

The end is nigh

I swear I’ll be

There when you die

Like a turd on a wire

With less mercy than desire

This nation’s tried in its way

To be free

To be there when I die

Oh when I die

I will not die

I will not die

With you

I will not die

Second Glance

Love at first sight my dear

Never got a second glance from me

‘Cause I’m more at home alone

And I know why my dear

At times a word is best denied a rhyme

How sweet the dream postponed

All the cruel boys at school

Were exceptions that proved the fool

Was me

But as the moth once exclaimed

I can’t really blame the flame

Not me

More heat than light my dear

They say youth is wasted on the young

But is age wasted on the old

A kiss can be bliss

When it spans the abyss

But then

I find that all that beguiles

And all that’s worthwhile

Must end

Love at first sight my dear

Never got a second glance from me

‘Cause I’m more at home alone

Home alone

Alone

Episode 2: “Fintan”

Toy Train

I rode a toy train from the Great Plains

To the city by the bay

The fog was air that you could see

And everybody’s mom was gay

Couldn’t get in a bar so I stole a car

And drove straight to the beach

I danced with myself upon the strand

Took my own trembling hand

And gave myself a single grain of sand

And my body sinks into the deep

The ocean fills me straight and true

My parting gift’s still mine to keep

As the world fills up and turns blue

A fish woke me up, he looked like a pup

I took him for a walk

We met a crab who drove a cab

He took us around the block

To the mouth of a volcano

I poured in some Draino

To clear the path ahead

You see I wanted to go all the way

To find a place where only I could stay

And sing songs from Cabaret all day

So I jumped right down into the deep

The fire filled me so straight and true

My grain of sand’s still mine to keep

As the world burns up and turns blue

Then I woke to my brother’s poke

My toy train had derailed

Mom had gone to bed and dad had fled

Fintan said you have failed

You can’t leave home, even after you’re grown.

‘Cause it always stays inside

So if you want to find a place

Where you don’t have run the human race

Keep your sand in your pocket just in case

And just sink down into the deep

Of a story that’s a lie but sounds so true

Sing me a song while I go to sleep

As the world fills up and turns blue

I Exist I just want you to know

That I blame you for

Killing me

Every day

Why do I

When you cry like that

I just want you to tell

Mom that she messed up, so bad

Why would I

When she’ll cry and be sad

Do you remember me or

Do you remember being told about me

What are you without me

I figure if you still hurt

Then I exist

I just want you to know

That I blame Dad too

For killing me

Why should I

When he’s already dead now

Tell me do you remember me or

Do you remember being told about me

What are you without me

I figure if you still hurt

Then I stand a chance

Of making a mark

Of leaving a trace

Of cause and effect

If you did this

You feel that

I’ll be all that you lack

I’m the kiss that you dare

But when lips part

Is the kiss still there

Do you remember me or

Do you remember being told about me

What are you without me

I figure if you still hurt

Then I exist

Episode 3: “Mnemonic” Gog and Demagogue

And if my body is evaporated sensations

Each thought a thwarted desire

Is my Tourette’s solely narration

For a world that’s lit up on fire

It’s not the worst

You’re not the first

When you can say it’s the worst

Oh oh oh oh

Is this mic still on?

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

There’s a bird in the embers

Allow and remember me

ADD, forgetfulness, anxiety, forgetfulness,

Abdominal distress, I think I just forgot my own address

I’m sensitive to pollen, to gluten, to moderation

Might I be a pillar of the Aryan nation

Raise up the demagogue

We are all God

For only a God hears his name

Every time it’s called, cursed, tagged, tweeted, hacked

God forbid my God is doxxed

Jesus Christ you’re hereby blocked

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

There’s a bird in the embers

Allow and remember

As we’re all dismembered I force myself

To look in the faces

Near, far, and wide

Try and see and

Identify

The expression

Of desperation

Allow and remember

They plead unto me

New Year’s resolutions

I’ll replace fiction with lies

Great White Hope covered in flies

Immigrants steal our erections

Viagra wins reelection

Ambien helps us sleep-shop

Fast forward to the cum shot

Delivery system over content

Mr. McLuhan has no comment

Screaming over speaking

Finding over seeking

Patching over mending

Breaking over bending

Lust over trust is

Revenge over justice

You take New York

I’ll stay right here

Lying in wait and gripped by fear

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

Allow and remember

As we’re dismembered

There’s a bird in the embers

Allow and remember

As we’re all dismembered

I force myself

To look in the faces

Near, far, and wide

Try and see and

Identify

The expressions

Of desperation

Allow and remember

They plead unto me

Know any good jokes

A guy walks into a bar

Lies down on the floor

And dies

Duet with America

I am not the one who loves you

I am just the one who comes to sleep

I am just the one who sees you

I am not the kind of dream you keep

I’m not nothing

Not your something

If you saw me as I saw you

I’m not nothing

Not your something

If you saw me

As I sow you’ll weep

I am not

I am not

I am not

I am only me

Metaphor

Oh sweet metaphor

Evens all the scores

Lost souls retrieved

Hanged thief walks free

When you accept and eat

The body and blood of God

You spare the child

And break the rod

Cheap muslin melts into silk

When laid over an old man's knee

Nothing is what it seems

When kisses replace his screams

When metaphor is invoked

Great kings remain unprovoked

O happy disaster

When slave becomes his master

Masks over faces

Become destiny

When metaphor

Rests in me

Episode 4: “The End of Love”

The End of Love

When I think about you

I think it’s all been said before

The words rang true

But what were they for

You were a small disappointment

Careless hand on the thigh

Sweet inferred words

That were never implied

Who could frame the fearful asymmetry between lust and love

Is God the synapse or the thought

Caught between what you want and what you bought

Are you the final thread that binds the world to me

Baby is that all that you want to be

The end of love is

A terraced grief

That’s like a drip down a mountain

That fills an ocean

I’ll carry you over the water

You grow heavier with every step

Until you drag me down as sure as Ophelia’s dress

Did you grant me existence

When a random thought of me

Shot through your mind

Like a wasp right through a web

You clothed me in life

But my garment strangles me

Like Desdemona struggling with fortune

And seeking her lover’s eyes

Is a mayfly tenure the best that you can offer me

You’re so wisely absent from past and future

But to me you’re nothing but a suture

To prevent their blending

Though my heart seems to be rending now

The longer I sit in my lonely room

Honey you’re the only lover that I believe in

The end of love is

A deus ex machina

But ain’t that better than a deus

So much more humane

So much more remains

After the play is over

The end of love

The end of love

The end of love

Episode 5: “The Seraph”

State Road

State Road, as long as the day

State Road, Salina to Hayes

State road, you’ve come a long way

State road, you’re falling away

You will never be the one who says are we there yet

I will never be the one who plays Russian roulette

You will never be the one who you could call a safe bet

Maybe you could be the one who catches my breath

Prayer of the Mandrake

Blow fly, soldier ant

Did you fear the void before

Wood vine, sweet plant

I fear the void hereafter

Little rat, big mouse

Take my fingers, take my toes

Moo cow, slaughter house

I don’t think she knows

Earth love me little

Earth love me long

Earth love me more

Than I ever done you wrong

The hanged man comes

It drips to the ground

The mandrake grows

A purple crown

Earth love me little

Earth love me long

Earth love me more

Than I ever done you wrong

Earth love me long enough

For me to finish this s--

Episode 6: “Let’s Hear the Needle Drop”

I See What I Am

Because a man cries

I am what I see

A woman sighs

What you see is me

But Mary says, Goddamn

I see what I am

At the beginning of time

There was no God

There was just a lonely woman

Whose life felt flawed

It was the birth of the blues

She hatched a plan

She said to herself

Ima make me a man

She huffed and puffed

And reached deep within

She birthed a manchild

Who was ugly as sin

She wrapped his face up in a cloud

As if he were maimed

When in fact he was proud

Because a man cries

I am what I see

A woman sighs

What you see is me

But Mary says, Goddamn

I see what I am

Now that’s how God

Came to insist

That nobody else

Really exists

He made a mirror

He called Mankind

Held it up to his face

Then he wished he was blind

He flung Mankind

Away in disgust

It shattered into

Pieces of us

But Mary swept us up so fast

You know she gave us the Earth

You know she blew us like glass

Because a man cries

I am what I see

A woman sighs

What you see is me

But Mary says, Goddamn

I see what I motherfucking am

Mary had a little lamb

And that’s when the shit hit the fan

Now did she regret it

Goddamn

Talk about the best laid plans

Did she regret it

Goddamn

Now the Virgin’s on the lam

Turns out he was just a man

And still we feel our Daddy’s blame

Our broken faces reflect his shame

We drown in drink, we spike our veins

We gorge on vengeance to purge the pain

From fix to fix I hop across the river

Just a single arrow in my quiver

I shelter within my future corpse

My body blackens, I scream til I’m hoarse

I once asked you to make it stop

My hands are shaky, my rhythm is shot

So baby if you love me, tie me off

Tacit the band, let’s hear the needle drop

And now Mother wild and true

I find that I must turn to you

When will you return

When will you return

The man who drowns floats face down

But the woman who dies faces the sky

Cloud of Unknowing (Jairo)

Every day

When I wake

I tell myself

There is a God

And He is not you.

We meet halfway

Shorn of age Feet unshod

Same time each day

To find out what is true

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

Father’s guitar is missing a string

The notes he can’t play I try to sing

I am blinded by his wings

Yet in darkness I accept all things

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

My mother’s tongue washes me clean

Her name means Little Girl

Menininha Mae, Mae Menininha

A grain of sand became a pearl

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

Will I be there when you die

I’ll take no eye for an eye

So I can see that it’s true

Only a stranger can heal you

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

Inside the cloud I feel fear grow

The words of my song might be denied

Light might fade, time might slow

Will you be there when I die

Love You For Free

When you wake up too soon

‘Cause slivers of the moon

Got under your skin

The walls are closing in

‘Cause down in the city

Only God knows you’re alone

When you feel there comes a time

That you are not mine

And I’m not yours

And hope itself ignores you

When the sigh you breathe is

All you have that’s yours to own

You were so early

You fit in my hand

Like a bird in a cup

Now when you grow up

Remember my face

Like a promise of grace

In this world, my child

You have a place

When God swings overhead

Like a body from a tree

Remember what I said

Don’t break the thread

Just float down the river

That splits into you and me

You were so early

You fit in my hand

Like a bird in a cup

Now when you grow up

Remember my face

Like a promise of grace

In this world my child

You have a place

Hush it’s just me

I’m one of the few

Who’s gonna love you for free

Won’t you take it from me

Just one of the few

Who’s gonna love you for free

Who’s gonna love you for free

When all that you need

Is more than you can stand

When all that you free

Has laid waste unto the land

Remember she who hates herself

Is not humble

Hush it’s just me

I’m one of the few

Who’s gonna love you for free

Won’t you take it from me

I’m one of the few

Who’s gonna love you for free

Who’s gonna love you for free

Episode 7: “Joan the Baptist”

The New Messiah

If you’re hoping to crucify it

You’re gonna need more wood

Blessed Mother

Don’t let my words

Be misunderstood

When the Outside becomes like the In

And Below like Above

If you want your Heaven like Hell

And love your Hate like Love

We are like the little bitty baby bird

With his little bitty tiny legs

Pushing all the unhatched eggs

Right outta the nest, right into the earth

Like a motherfucking man possessed

With the burden of survival

He will countenance no rival

And neither do I motherfucker

When the Two become One, and the Moon become Sun

When He become She, and She is a He

And the Inside like Out, and Below like Above

And Heaven like Hell, and Hate like Love

When you bring me an eye, I will fill your third orbit

You will see the inner truth of every man who could abhor it

See a Christ who eats humanity’s sin without torment

Nails Caesar to a cross, and topples the government

When you martyr the damned to the damned, free for all to see

Cut off the hand too small to build a wall to keep us

From our revenge against the old men above us

You speak the truth to power

We will bleed until you love us

We will bleed until you love us

You got to

Smash the power

Mama knows he’s got it coming

Kill the killer

But please Goddess don’t become him

Blacken the sky

You better believe he’ll be runnin’

Uncover the lie

Sweet mother, I have opened my heart to

Pure eternity yeah

Empty out your head and your heart

Let in the refugee yeah

Let in the refugee yeah

Let in the refugee

Now let me hear you scream for the Messiah’s arrival

Everybody Look

Everybody look

Don’t close your eyes

Seen it all

You’re in for a surprise

Everybody

La la la la la look now

Two plus one to me equals fun

Add it all up or you won’t get none

Everybody

La la la la look now

Baby I know it’s hard to find

The hand that fits the glove

But if you find two hands to fit it

Just call it modern love

I gotta live my life like I want

I cry inside but I act nonchalant

La la la la look now

But if my baby needs it then

You know I’ll give it all

Episode 8: “If You Were Born”

If You Were Born

And

If you were born

Great minds just might confer

To decide just what you were

As if you were something to add

To what they already had

And as if knowing would not

Make them sad

And

If you were born

They would call you a symbol

As our need for them dwindles

A metaphor washed up on a wave

A simile pale and blind in a cave

We are all born astride our

Own grave

But

If you lived

I might carry you in a jar

Together we’d travel far

You could never leave

You would always be

Something to

Something to

Take care of

And

If you were born

Holy men just might repent

And their holy wars lament

To some you’d be a dangerous thing

Less of a prophet and more of a king

You’d silence the past and make the

Future sing

And

If we lived

I might carry you in a jar

Together we’d travel far

You’d not want to leave

For I’d always be

Something you

Something you take care of

Nothing to

Nothing to beware of

But some will call you strange

As if you called for change

For in the times when you fail

Crueler heads will prevail

Screaming: Witch, sink or swim

And they will tear you limb from limb

From limb from limb from limb

From limb

Cloud of Unknowing (Joan)

Every day babe

I tell myself

There is a God

And She is not you

We meet halfway

Feet unshod

Same time each day

To find out what is true

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

Father’s guitar is missing a string

The notes he can’t play I try to sing

I am blinded by his wings

Yet in darkness I accept all things

I will not rule and

I will not be ruled

In the Cloud of Unknowing

I will not be fooled

My mother’s tongue washes me clean

Her name means Little Girl

Menininha Mae, Mae Menininha

A grain of sand became a pearl

Nobody Blink

He’s a man kept on a chain

Marked for life like the head of Cain

Fears the sun and melts in rain

He’s a man on a chain

In his hand holds the key

Takes us in we’ll set you free

Now everybody drink from the same cup

Everybody thinks we’re just acting up

Now nobody blink

You’ll miss the chance for love

Nobody blink

Philosopher’s Stone

If I could’ve conceived you alone

I would have

Used the philosopher’s stone

I should have

Laid my seed like a baby

In the earth’s warm womb

Beside it a firefly

To ease the gloom

Fed you with a dropper

Full of my blood

Til the shape of a son

Crawled up from the mud

If nature could bring about

A seahorse or a worm

Let there be no doubt

I’d have carried you to term

If I could have told you the future

I would have

But life is a dissolving suture

I could have

Unbroken the mold

When you came of age

Gained riches untold

We’d harness our rage.

Let’s lay down our burden

May the gods of the brine

Grant us the kindness

Of this vision of mine

The women are gone

God bless the cage

We built it ourselves

And no one’s the wiser

There’s no one left

Just a couple of misers

Plenty to eat

Nothing to farm

No one to meet

No one to harm

So many streets

To be renamed

So many songs

To be reclaimed

My son, I would

Give you a world

Without shame

Episode 9: “Vivimancer” Unborn/Unsound

Oh, to be unborn

All is unsound

Curtain is untorn

All vows are unbound

Trapped inside the cloud

Cumulus like brains

Speaking unaloud

Of uncoming rain

I’m the king inside the mound

From below I watch and wait

My days too vast to count

My voice too worn to pray

But I will be

Your good thing

I will be

Your friend

I pray I’ll remember

How all of this began

By the time

I reach

The end

Oh won’t you hear me and heed me

All you addicts of future drugs Give us a tit to suck on

Is all I can hear from you

Think I’m gonna have to give

All you junkies hugs

It’s your mama you’ll be needing

All I got to give is my blood

But if I’m the only one

You can get your dirty hands on

We’ll get on down

And wrestle in the Kansas mud

And I’ll try to be

Your good thing

Then you will reap

All that good brings

Just pray that you remember

How it all began

By the time

You bring about

My end

There was nothing to do

And I did it

There was everything to gain

But I hid it

If you touch my face

What dies in another place

I don’t know if it’s right

But I know outside is bright

I want to be your good thing

I want to be your good thing

I swear I will be

Your good thing

Soon we will see

All that good brings

I pray you retrace

All of the lines

That we wend

After you realize

My end

Dissolve Me

Mother is first lover

Pull the pin out of the doll

Prick a hole in the rubber

Baby’s born against the wall

If a woman’s blood is chaos

And a man’s sperm is form

Our progeny must obey us

I command my first born

By the power of the child absolve me

For what I did to you

Dissolve me resolve me

Into something that is new

I take it all back

I wither on the vine

Don’t step on the crack

That breaks your own spine

I want to feel that spasm

Right before I go to sleep

I’m at the lip of the chasm

Push me ‘cause I can’t leap

By the power of the child absolve me

For what I did to you

Dissolve me resolve me

Into something that is new

By the power of the child absolve me

For what I did to you

Dissolve me resolve me

Into something that is new

I am permanent disruption

On the tip of my own tongue

Seeking final interruption

Let my song remain unsung

I’m the one who chewed your food

So you could swallow it

Future’s rigged polls are skewed

I’m the rule now follow it

By the power of the child absolve me

For what I did to you

Dissolve me resolve me

Into something that is new

By the power of the child absolve me

For what I did to you

Dissolve me resolve me

Into something that is new

Episode 10: “The Unnameable”

The Quiet Savior

Every day

I remind myself

That there is a God

And that he’s not me

Speak less than you know

Give more than you owe

Live alone, follow the rules

Suffer children, suffer fools

Tell the truth, to one at a time

In blank verse, nothing that rhymes

Rise early and carry the day

In a reusable bag, and I pray

You love me little and love me long

For a quiet savior can do no wrong

Love me, love me, love me little

Love me, love me, love me long

No wrong

No wrong

Build something small

Without excuse

Show it to few

Put it to use

Don’t call attention

Don’t rock the boat

Don’t take the bait

Don’t read what you wrote

Look through our eyes

And know we can’t see you

Look through our eyes

And hope we won’t fear you

See all that we see

Hear all that we hear

Feel all that we feel

Know all that we

All we know

What we know

The Unnameable

Great Whore rides the Beast

Worm makes of itself a feast

Raise the Cup of Abominations

It’s the Final Fragmentation

The Nine-Headed Dragon

Brings the Virgin

To her knees

Christ embraces Anti-Christ

And they vanish

Into the deep

The Judgment of the Wicked

Trumps the Glory of the Saved

It’s not as predicted

It’s the Rapture of the Depraved

I am the microbiome

That feeds on your lies

I am the chancres in place of

Your eyes

What’s my name

I’ll eat your shame

You should

Have known

That I would break your

Bones

Move From Me

The drowned memory

Has devoured all meaning

It hits the mainline

And poisons all history

It will take away

The risk of salvation

The very pith of hope

And the prayer of reconciliation

So move from me, move from us

The old memories who flash on a screen

Move from him, move from us

You have no power here, you’re not what you seem.

Move away on crippled wing

On shattered back you broken thing

Move from me, move from us

We are the love that should have been

We are the true microbiome

We digest we protect

We turn the earth and seed the loam

When that black sun

Turns from night into day

Light is reborn

Memory regained

Both cradle and grave

Appear in the same frame

Sickness passes

Wholeness comes to the lame

A child loves but grows to know my mind

He drowns in fear chokes on ties that bind

Move from him, move from us

You’ll draw no life from a child of mine

We are the true

The true microbiome

You will pass with the dregs

Your seed unsown

You have no claim

We’ve come to take him home

So move from me

We will not give you a name

So move from me

Move from him

The Unnameable (Reprise)

My life for a name

My life for a name

I should have grown

I should have known

That you would break

My bones

The End of Love (Reprise)

I wrote a song about us

To a melody that you knew

Simple words you distrust

But hard is not true

You never looked away

Your eyes were trained on me

While I gazed within

And found I wasn’t free

When you love your neighbor

The way you love yourself

You must beware the danger

Hate can spread by stealth

Children are surprised

When their first words are heard

All my life I was advised

That loved did not mean cured

The end of love is

A terraced grief

That’s like a drip down a mountain

That fills an ocean

Carry me over the water

I’ll grow lighter with every step

Until I lift like mist

And you can see your way to health

The end of love is

A deus ex machina

But ain’t that better

Than a deus

So much more humane

But you will not remain

After the play is over

The end of love

The end of love

The end of love

Duet with America (Reprise)

I am just the one who holds you

You are just the one who comes to sleep

I am just the one who sees you

I am not the kind of dream you keep

I am nothing

Not your something

If I saw you as you see me

I’m not nothing

I’m your something

If I saw you

As you grow I’ll weep

For I am now

I am now

I am now

I am now

Free

Hymn to Life

Give me little something Mama

Give me little something now

Give me little something Daddy

You said you would, you gave me your vow

Don’t take it from no poor man Mama

Ain’t free from no rich man no how

Never take from the mouth of another child

Take it from the heaviest bough

See me coming

Up that hill

You can see me coming now

Bringing something

Good for my baby

I swear you keep me true to my vow

Once I saw my Mama running

I saw her run away from the plow

I don’t know why my God ain’t coming

Don’t know why she broke her vow

Sometimes I think your Daddies are coming

Thought I’d see them again somehow

Sweet baby keeps me from stumbling

Baby’s all that Heaven allows

See me coming

Up that hill

You can see me coming now

Bringing something

Good for my baby

I’d breathe my last

For your first smile

There are tears to drink

An endless supply

I step back from the brink

There is time enough to die

Sometimes I don’t know

What to think

Hush little baby now

I’ll step back from the brink

If you can’t give a little something people

If you can’t wipe the sweat from your brow

If you can’t hear no bell from no steeple

Then take it from me right now

A cup is going round

The congregation

There is rain left in the cloud

When it comes round to you from the gíving hand

Take a sip and pass it on with a smile

See me coming

A running today

Tomorrow you’ll be coming to me

Bringing something

Good for your Momma

You know

She’s gonna love you for free

I got tears to drink

Offered from dry eyes

I step back from the brink

Hush little baby now don’t you cry

Let’s all step back

Back from the brink

Hush little baby now

There is time

Yet to live