Dog Faced Hermans

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Hum of life

Jan 9   Viva   The hook and the wire   How we connect   Love split with blood   Wings   White indians   Hear the dogs   Love is the heart of everything   Madame la Mer   Peace warriors

 

Engineered by Jamie Watson
P produced by DFH & Jamie Watson at Chamber Studio, Edinburgh, Jan'93

Jan 9

Jan 9
in future time,
the day science clipped the wings.
Nobody flew.
We all stood around
shaking hands on the ground.
Congratulating ourselves.

(We could only see the soles of their feet,
we thought there were angels up ahead)

We decided that science
which restricts information to the powers-that-be,
is a bad science.

We decided no more
to be utilised
as "the objective voice"

We decided no more
to blind the people
that we knew more things
about that which is
invisible than they,

We decided that
that which does not advance
us is directly aligned to
that which destroys.

We decided that the resources
are after all
finite.

Pure polemic - in the area of the imagination, a report from a future conference of the sciences and the invisible world, guided by the spirit of Buckminster Fuller.

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Viva

In the vicious flares
of the mad young men.
In the the coated curls
of the up-faced girls.
In the thickening
of my mother's leg
I see what's to come.

Sister walks alone
through the streets at night.
Mother is at home
with the telephone.
Brother's never there,
in the north somewhere
chasing up the work.

All the boards are up.
Houses all for sale
patterning the street,
with the gardens wild.
I can't keep the junk
from the door at night.

I am in my tribe
with its dark complaint
that you often hear
on the women's lips
as they lose their grip:
where did we go wrong?

I go to my friends
and we sit in bars,
and we talk like girls
who are making plans
to get out of here.

baby baby pink
baby baby blue.
No one ever said
it would be like this.
I don't feel at home.

London 1973

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The hook and the wire

Give her the money and let her take care of it
The hook and the wire and the bloody red red

Give her the letter and let her take care of it
The hook and the wire and the bloody red red

Give her the bottle and let her take care of it
The hook and the wire and the bloody red red

Give her the number and let her take care of it
The hook and the wire and the bloody red red red

Oh I living, I living, I low

Give her the money and let her take care of it
The hook and the wire and the bloody red red

Give her the bottle, she'll walk through the streets with it
The stairs, the stairs, the falling-down accident

Give her the powder and let her take care of it
We got her in stitches, we got her in stitches

Give her the father and let him take care of it
The fool, the fool, the fool, dirty little, dirty little...

She's wearing a coat that's too thin for the weather

The song of the Hook and the Wire goes on and on.
Abortion in backstreets, still, and all over the place.

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How we connect

I hover - you stutter - we miss - and crash.
The mystery lies in the space between us.

My tongue gibbers but in your language.

It's a miracle thing - godsake - how we connect

Fact of life is a fact of distance
Poverty lies in the space between us
Mystery lies in the space between us
I make sound which approaches language
Make my tongue a physical one
Fact of life is a fact of closeness
I lose nothing in this attempt

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Love split with blood

Dog Faced Hermans, Love split with blood

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Wings

Somewhere in wartime
She lost her heart
They came back heroes
with wings on.

This was not romance
Nor glorycide
Back with white feathers
and wings on.

Ask her to show you
She'll tell you something
A story of time
stopping.

Ask her to show you
She'll show you something
Pretty gold medal
with wings on.

And if you go there
Know why you go
Don't let them sell you
Those wings on.

TOP

White indians

The first thing
we can hope for
after the next,
great catalypsis.
Is that the sun,
will come up
over the bridge,
like it did
yesterday
and the day before.

But by then,
we'll all be indians
anyway.

White indians,
Dark indians...

TOP

Hear the dogs

Welcome, welcome
I would give you the freedom of my own home,
and you may sit in my kitchen,
between the hours of five and six.
And you may butter your bread
on the one side only.
And we can do this,
because we're quite groovy so you're lucky.
Remember.
Welcome -
wipe your feet.
I would give you the freedom of my own home,
and you may butter your bread
on the one side only,
only on the one side.

-But hear the dogs barking
outside.

-Everything in limitation,
nothing open-handed
This is some country this is
this is some country.
-Everything in limitation,
nothing open-handded

What did you expect?
What did you expect when you came?

Hear the dogs barking
outside.

Summer 92.
Dutch police, dogs, handlers and a number of helicopters raid the warehouses of BLOKKER, a large supermarket chain, in a flushing-out operation against illegal (read immigrant) workers. They were later criticised for the extremity of the action.
In the liberal fatlands the hands of welcome extended to immigrant peoples, economic or political refugees, is highly ambivalent -- with the notorious exception of Britain which flaunts its mean spirit, its closed doors and inhumane immigration policies.

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Love is the heart of everything

When the truth begins to show
Man becomes a living soul.
when the honey hits the core
Then my sweet is everywere.

She sits down to write him hers
-every second enclose you.
He receives her with his eyes
-let this moment include you.
she sits down to write him hers
-let this hour encompass you.
He receives with his eyes
-let this day be marked by you.

Title is Mayakovsky's - letter to Lili Brik.

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Madame la Mer

Madame la Mer
Loosen your stays,
Throw off those old whale bones.

Carry me
on the wide-hipped sea.
Throw off those old whale bones.

Hold your ground
When your ship goes down.
Throw off those old whale bones.

Madame la Mer
Loosen your stays,
Throw off those old whale bones.

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Peace warriors