elvis costello
bedlam
I've got this phosphorescent portrait of gentle Jesus meek and mild I've got this harlot that I'm stuck with carrying another man's child The solitary star announcing vacancy burnt out as we arrived They'd throw us back across the border if they knew that we survived  And they were surprised to see us So they greeted us with palms They asked for ammunition, acts of contrition and small alms I might recite a small prayer  If I ever said them I lay down on an iron frame Found myself in bedlam I wish that I could take something for drowning out the noise  Wailing echoes down the corridors I've got this imaginary radio, and I'm punching up the dial I've got the A.C. trained on the T.V. so it won't blow up in my eye And everything that I thought fanciful and mocked as too extreme  Must be family entertainment here in the strange land of my dreams Now I'm practicing my likeness of St. Francis of Assisi For if I hold my hand outstretched A little bird comes to me  I might recite a small prayer If I ever said them I lay down on an iron frame Found myself in bedlam  Escaping from the fingers that were stretching through the bars Wailing echoes down the corridors The player piano picks out "Life Goes On" Ring tone rang out "Jerusalem"  And in this pit of sadness Where the rank of wretched plunge We've buried all the innocents Now we must bury revenge  They've got this scared and decorated girl strapped to the steel trunk of a mustang And then they drove her down a cypress grove where traitors hang and stars still spangle They dangled flags and other rags along a colored thread of twine And then they dragged that bruised and purple heart along the road to Palestine  Someone went off muttering, he mentioned thirty pieces Easter saw a slaughtering, each wrapped in bloodstained fleeces Then my thoughts returned to vengeance, but I put up no resistance Though I seemed a long way from my home  It really was no distance And I might recite a small prayer If I ever said them I lay down on an iron frame  Found myself in bedlam Bowing like an actor acknowledging applause Playing the Crusader who was conquering the Moors And he knew the consequences, but he won't accept the cause Wailing echoes down the corridors