The Celebration of the Lizard - Live at the Aquarius, First Performance

Lions in the street and roaming
 Dogs in heat, rabid, foaming
 A beast caged in the heart of a city
 The body of his mother
 Rotting in the summer ground
 He fled the town
 He went down South and crossed the border
 Left the chaos and disorder
 Back there over his shoulder
 One morning he awoke in a green hotel
 With a strange creature groaning beside him
 Sweat oozed from its shiny skin
 Is everybody in?
 The ceremony is about to begin
 Wake up!
 You can't remember where it was
 Had this dream stopped?
 The snake was pale gold
 Glazed and shrunken
 We were afraid to touch it
 The sheets were hot dead prisons
 And she was beside me
 Old, she's not, young
 Her dark red hair
 Her white soft skin
 Now, run to the mirror in the bathroom
 Look!
 He's coming in here
 I can't live thru each slow century of her moving
 I let my cheek slide down
 The cool smooth tile
 Feel the good cold stinging blood
 The smooth hissing snakes of rain . . .
 Once I had, a little game
 I liked to crawl back into my brain
 I think you know the game I mean
 I mean the game called 'go insane'
 Now you should try this little game
 Just close your eyes forget your name
 Forget the world forget the people
 And we'll erect a different steeple
 This little game is fun to do
 Just close your eyes no way to lose
 And I'm right there I'm going too
 Release control we're breaking thru
 Way back deep into the brain
 Back where there's never any pain
 And the rain falls gently on the town
 And over the heads of all of us
 And in the labyrinth of streams
 Beneath, the quiet unearthly presence of
 Nervous hill dwellers in the gentle hills around
 Reptiles abounding
 Fossils, caves, cool air heights
 Each house repeats a mold
 Windows rolled
 Beast car locked in against morning
 All now sleeping
 Rugs silent, mirrors vacant
 Dust blind under the beds of lawful couples
 Wound in sheets
 And daughters, smug
 With semen eyes in their nipples
 Wait
 There's been a slaughter here
 (Don't stop to speak or look around
 Your gloves and fan are on the ground
 We're getting out of town
 We're going on the run
 And you're the one I want to come)
 Not to touch the earth
 Not to see the sun
 Nothing left to do, but
 Run, run, run
 Let's run
 House upon the hill
 Moon is lying still
 Shadows of the trees
 Witnessing the wild breeze
 C'mon baby run with me
 Let's run
 Run with me
 Run with me
 Run with me
 Let's run
 The mansion is warm, at the top of the hill
 Rich are the rooms and the comforts there
 Red are the arms of luxuriant chairs
 And you won't know a thing till you get inside
 Dead president's corpse in the driver's car
 The engine runs on glue and tar
 C'mon along, we're not going very far
 To the East to meet the Czar
 Some outlaws lived by the side of the lake
 The minister's daughter's in love with the snake
 Who lives in a well by the side of the road
 Wake up, girl! We're almost home
 Sun, sun, sun
 Burn, burn, burn
 Soon, soon, soon
 Moon, moon, moon
 I will get you
 Soon!
 Soon!
 Soon!
 Let the carnival bells ring
 Let the serpent sing
 Let everything
 We came down
 The rivers and highways
 We came down from
 Forests and falls
 We came down from
 Carson and Springfield
 We came down from
 Phoenix enthralled
 And I can tell you
 The names of the Kingdom
 I can tell you
 The things that you know
 Listening for a fistful of silence
 Climbing valleys into the shade
 'I am the Lizard King
 I can do anything
 I can make the earth stop in its tracks
 I made the blue cars go away
 For seven years I dwelt
 In the loose palace of exile
 Playing strange games
 With the girls of the island
 Now I have come again
 To the land of the fair, and the strong, and the wise
 Brothers and sisters of the pale forest
 O Children of Night
 Who among you will run with the hunt?
 Now Night arrives with her purple legion
 Retire now to your tents and to your dreams
 Tomorrow we enter the town of my birth
 I want to be ready'