[Intro] -red- -red- nnn eyes [Verse 1] [Fingerpicked low strings.] The ridge above a silhouette black across the moon two coals for eyes, a wingspan eating June from June no bird lifts like that, no owl owns a chest that wide it watched the car the way a lock regards the key outside She almost laughed then could not laugh the red had entered language and it would not give it back [Verse 2] [Phone-line hiss .] Then voices in the wire began to practice fate they named a street, an hour, a trouble, and the date men dressed like clerks arrived to ask what you had seen their smiles were measured and their questions were too clean the dogs went flat the cattle sat and every porchlight flickered like a lid above a vat -do not look up- -you looked- [Pre-Chorus] [Choir.] Scripture keeps a sentence for the moment terror starts it spends that sentence first, before it shows its heart [Chorus] [Full band. Stomps ] (What comes in love says be not afraid) (it lays a name across the blade) (What comes unloving will not say be not afraid) (it lets the looking be the blade) (Be not afraid) (the river weighed) (Be not afraid) (the cable frayed) (Be not afraid) -and no one stayed- (to speak the line the old law made) [Verse 3] [Half-time. Organ.] Call Him a god if you still need the mouth to work the one who splits a sea still bothers with a word He wrecks you, then He tells you why the wreck was owed He loves the thing He sets His fear upon the road Now set that next to what lay under point Pleasant ground older than announcement, older than the sound of any mercy moving in a human throat no face you could endure, no covenant, no note without the love the holy is a lock upon the lung you cannot kneel, you cannot run, you cannot find your tongue the miracle arrives and bargains with your dread the under-thing arrives and simply keeps your head [Chorus] (What comes in love says be not afraid) (it lays a name across the blade) (What comes unloving will not say be not afraid) (it lets the looking be the blade) (Be not afraid) (the river weighed) (Be not afraid) (the cable frayed) (Be not afraid) -and no one stayed- (to speak the line the old law made) [The Foolish Prophet] Brother Trickster rented out the shoulder of the road he sold the omen bottled, and he sold it à la mode The wing has chosen me to clarify your rent your marriage, and the number on the bridge abutment He blinked back at the blink and called the blink a vow he wrote a pamphlet titled What the Red Allows He prophesied the righteous would be waved across the span the span, unmoved by pamphlets, did what iron can He was at home he had a second service planned he told the widows he had almost held its hand A deputy asked, quiet, what the eyes had meant Trickster checked the rate card and he billed the bereavement -amen- -that will be extra- [Final Chorus] (What comes in love says be not afraid) (it lays a name across the blade) (What comes unloving will not say be not afraid) (it lets the looking be the blade) (Be not afraid) (the river weighed) (Be not afraid) (the cable frayed) (Be not afraid) -and no one stayed- (to speak the line the old law made) [Outro] December took the silver in its teeth the evening traffic and the forty-six beneath some say the wing was fed the eyes went out the phones went dead and nothing, after, said be not afraid
