Thoughts of a Useless Mind

A Collection of Irish Shanties

By Alexandria Drouin

 

Cemetery Ballet

 

Dragging the stick along the fence

Approaching the graveyard where they buried the remains

A stone: “Here lies her hopes and dreams”

The roses will rise, but the ground will freeze

 

A beautiful carousel covered in snow

It rotated when he loved her so

White dress with a shimmering light

Slides off into the starry night

 

It will be stained

It will grieve

Danny Boy is lost at sea

Sparkle, a frost, and a winter ballet

She must dance for the king, and she knows she must stay

 

The roses will rise, but the ground will freeze

Teardrops ice skate on crystal trees

Teardrops like knives fall from the sky

She must dance for the king, but then she must die

 

Music Sharp

 

Music is a simple sound

One song lost, another found

Like trinkets that no longer wind up

Like a man who taught himself to swim

Then taught himself to think it

 

But as soon as our lives rise like bread

Songs begin to stay instead

Taking tedious shelter in our heads

And we pay the bills, and we make the beds

 

Listening with consistent pain and vigilance

We’ve molded its significance

String, woodwind, brass, percussion

Rhymes of our youth become wars of discussion

 

Minds of the mindless, and extraordinary minds

Fall under the spell of search, and you will find

Running like hide and seek

Even my own songs find out where I sleep

 

Mirrors, mirrors

We take them all down

When every image now carries a sound

Tragically every heartbeat carries a weight

Seeking no further than the last time we ate

 

Let them know

 

Let this madman shoot me down

Let my blood sink in the ground

And when they smell my blood from hell

Let them know just why I fell

 

Let this madman tie me in chains

Let my blood soak in when it rains

And when they smell my blood from hell

Let them know just why I fell

 

Let this madman watch me drown

Let my blood disperse around

And when they smell my blood from hell

Let them know just why I fell

 

Let this madman burn my dreams

Let my eyes bleed when I scream

And when they smell my blood from hell

Let them know just why I fell

 

Let this madman shoot me down

Let my blood sink in the ground

And when they smell my blood from hell

Let them know just why I fell

 

Wild-Dog-Wood

 

He’d hop the train to Boston

Wild-Dog-Wood

He’d walk the tracks for a handful of nights

Because he knew he could

 

At night, the dogs would yell and he would sing

He’d lick his wounds and play three on a five string

 

Amidst the mist he’d cook his fish

He’d stolen from a liar

Begged for forgiveness

And warmed his paws by the fire

 

I had no need for a hound

And all its bad habits

But if I bound him down

Who would hunt the rabbits?

 

So I watched him kill the man who drank the clean water

I watched him from afar

In the cold and distant slaughter

 

I watched him sin till it woke me from my sleep

But when the dinner bell rang

There be rabbit by my feet