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TOURNIQUET LYRICS
"The Collected Works of Tourniquet" (1996 Best of/Compilation)
1. Perfect Night for a Hanging
2. Vanishing Lessons
3. Pathogenic Ocular Dissonance
4. Twilight
5. Psycho Surgery
6. You Get What You Pray For
7. Acid Head
8. Broken Chromosomes
9. Viento Borrascoso (Devastating Wind)
10. Carry The Wounded
11. Bearing Gruesome Cargo
12. The Skeezix Dilemma
13. Ark of Suffering
14. The Hand Trembler
1. Perfect Night for a Hanging
Enter the mind of a man torn in two
One of twelve but is destined to do
What the black heart of a person can feel
When he follows what he sees to be real
His eyes
Say he already knows
My resentment now grows
I know what I must do
To thine own self be true
I know you are who you say that you are
Branded a traitor I feel very far
My mind and my heart don't appear to agree
This is what causes my hectic quandry
I'll always regret what I'm choosing today
I realize that you love me anyway
Trapped
But as hard as I try
Can't continue this lie
Hang
From the limb of a tree
I just gotta be me
2. Vanishing Lessons
Silently vanishing, then reappearing
Slipping away for a while
Start dematerializing before your eyes
Always a step from our grasp
At the turn of the century
Lived a Mr. Houdini
Shrouded in a mystery
He fooled all humanity
Why is it a mystery
The very thing that seems to me
Explains itself so easily
The love of wealth brings misery
Things we acquire means fuel for the fire
The feeling is gone, then our soul we will pawn
Things we acquire means fuel for the fire
The feeling is gone, then our soul we will pawn
Chinese water torture cell
And metamorphosis
Jail escapes, buried alive
Walking through a solid wall
Suicide among the rich
Defies the laws of reason which
Tells us those who have it all
Must often answer to death's call
Things we acquire means fuel for the fire
The feeling is gone, then our soul we will pawn
Dollars for happiness, that's what the world tells us
Pour all yourself in the pursuit of wealth
Things we acquire means fuel for the fire
The feeling is gone, then our soul we will pawn
Dollars for happiness, that's what the world tells us
Pour all yourself in the pursuit of wealth
"There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless
which cannot be touched without emotion. Even
with the utterly lost to whom life and death are
equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can
be made"
Ever since I was a boy
I have always kept your laws
Now I want to follow you
Join you in your noble cause
Jesus turned to him and said
Sell all you have, give to the poor
The rich your ruler hung his head
Not to follow, walked instead
[Quote from The Masque Of The Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe]
3. Pathogenic Ocular Dissonance
The iguanidae sees East and West simultaneously
The praying mantis sees three hundred flies from three
Orbit of man, divergent strabismus and
Compound eyes alien by design
Pathogenic Ocular Dissonance
Unravel the surcingle, clotted and much
Excoriated eons of life unsound
Avert your gaze, the horrific pestilence
You are spared and standing on Holy ground
Searching nystagmus, it's no wonder
Spiritual migraines still persist
The scales fall, the cataracts desist
The life you once led is not even missed
Pathogenic Ocular Dissonance
When red is green and green is grey
Tou've failed the test in column A
You see at twenty what we do at fifty
The wisdom of sight comes from the father of lights
The treasure you see, the treasure you know
There will your heart be found also
4. Twilight
When Father Time begins to run out on you
There's a place we take you to
"Just a burden now", I heard them say
I know I'm just in the way
You watch the car as they drive slowly away
Their guilt will hang on them for just today
All alone you sit, the phone never rings
Each day new sorrow brings
And the holidays, they come and they go
But there's one thing that I know
Even though my family counts me for dead
I never see them anyway
My life to God is not a worthless mistake
He's right there with me in my endless heartache
Can you look away from all this pain
Or do you think it isn't there
Can you look away from all this pain
Say you just don't really care
As we lock our priceless heritage away
Our kin the elderly
Do you know someone who stares at the walls
I think you know what to do
5. Psycho Surgery
Cranial vault the mind's map paved by heart and soul's aim
Transfer of DNA forms the cerebral mainframe
Just like a computer garbage in - garbage out
Subdural detour shuns the embrace of logic and reason
Shrouded in doubt
Divine mental biopsy reveals you need psycho surgery
The renewing of your mind by cosmic mirror
Spiritual angiography illustrates the mind's sorry state
Barnacle ridden psyche man's own demise to demonstrate
Burrowing mole exposes the dry rot within
Abundance of wormwood, euphorism for sin
Divine mental biopsy reveals you need psycho surgery
By His Spirit the symptoms are starting to clear
Blind cavefish, inbred victim of ocular atrophy
Inky blackness everywhere, there's no reason to see
Wait is someone there? I can feel the heat
Limbs wax useless, help me, can't rise to my feet
Divine mental biopsy reveals you need psycho surgery
A shred of truth is illuminated by miner's light
Divine mental biopsy reveals you need psycho surgery
From the first touch a faint pulse begins to appear
6. You Get What You Pray For
All of a sudden
This big world will end
Bollions of people
Will wish it never began
Let us pray
No amount of wisdom
Stature or wealth
Will impress the ever-loving God
Or (that is) Christ Himself
Let us pray
You get what you pray for
Forgiveness and grace Lord
Ohh - That's what I need
You get what you pray for
Salvation is there for you
Get on your knees
Do you really think
That God grades on a curve
When all of the answers
Are found in the Word
Let us pray
Who shall you blame
When you're standing in flames
Ya can't pray to Jesus
He won't know your name
Let us pray
You get what you pray for
And that's what it's there for
Ohh - That's what I need
You get what you pray for
And God knows what's best for you
Oh - Get on your knees
You say there's so many things that you need
You never get them cause they would decieve (you)
A man can't stumble
When he's on his knees
So let us pray!
All of sudden
God's grace will be torn
Billion's of hell bound
Will wish they never were born
Let us pray
None of your excuses
Or shattering yells
Will turn the head of God
Who once called for your help
Lets us pray
You get what you pray for
And that's what it's there for
Oh - that's what I need
You get what you pray for
What more could you ask for
Oh - but ya gotta believe!
You say there's so many things that you need
You never listen so you won't receive
Seek first the kingdom He knows what you need before you pray
You get what you pray for
7. Acid Head
Johnny is a chemist's son
But Johnny is no more
What Johnny thought was H2O
Was H2SO4
Water cleans the system
Acid eats the flesh
Squirm yourself much deeper
Into the pit of selfishness
The burn of death is what you crave
I'll gladly bow and be your slave
To serve you all the days I live
My chemical god to you I give
Acid head - walk like the dead
Acid head - life in the red
Pacify your emptiness
It becomes more, you become less
All the platitudes you need
Planted by the demon seed
Hurting only me not you
To those around, it isn't true
The life you wreck is not your own
He grieves upon His holy throne
Acid head - walk like the dead
Acid head - life in the red
Acid head
Acid head - walk like the dead
Walk like the dead
Life in the red
Walk like the dead
Close the book, it's time to die
Don't get up, don't even try
Think about your soul instead
Where will you be when you're dead
Johnny is a chemist's son
But Johnny is no more
What Johnny thought was H2O
Was H2SO4
Acid head - walk like the dead
Acid head - life in the red
Acid head - walk like the dead
Acid head - life in the red
8. Broken Chromosomes
I want to take my life today
I don't belong here anyway
My God if you can hear me now
See if Your hand can reach this far
You stopped playing father
As soon as mom conceived
The only time we touched
Was just before I screamed
The gift that keeps on giving
Your father gives to me
History repeats itself
Now history meets me
So what if I'm retarded
Mentally delayed
I'm sorry for annoying you
But I was born this way
You speak so much better
Got an aerodynamic face
Mega-babes and tons of friends
So why show so much hate
Vultures are circling again
My open wounds are food for them
Oh God if you will reach your hand
You can deliver me from man
But I'll get up
I'll get up
Watch me get up
Men fail me...
But the Son of God saves
When I'm face down
And I'm scared and lonely
You are by my side
I'm talkin' face on the ground
My back is painted with footprints
You're the only one
That hears me cry
I seek I find just one name
By which a man can be saved
And He comes before
My tears can dry
Now I'm not alone
No I'm not alone
And I'm free now cause
I've got no pain to pass on
9. Viento Borrascoso (Devastating Wind)
10. Carry The Wounded
We all have known someone
Whose life has come undone
But careful, lest you fall
For help you will call
The Word was my desire
To calm the raging fire
Within me burning
And solace I did find
My wounds He did bind
The trials were sent in love
To make me rise above
And like the prodigal son
Thy will be done
Will I ever feel your love again?
And is this empty heart something you'll mend?
Carry the wounded
Can my mind and will on You depend?
Or will I fade into oblivion?
Carry the wounded
11. Bearing Gruesome Cargo
This is why I am the way that I am
This is why I am the way that I am
This is why I am the way that I am
This is why I am the way that I am
You know I'm carrying with me
Over twenty years of pity
My whole personality
Was formed by others, not me
When I look back on my life
One that's always filled with strife
I rode down a bad course
Nobody's fault but yours
My step always threw me right down the stairs
So forgive me when I do the same thing to you
I know it must seem like you're daddy never cares
But if you knew what I've been through
You'd do the same thing too
Well I can't make a move
Without draggin' all my baggage
My father always cursed
So firgive me for my language
Please excuse me for yelling
Pardon me for telling you to stop
Selling to me your God in Heaven
This is why I am the way that I am
This is why I am the way that I am
If I can keep this up for the rest of my days
I may never have to take responsability
For my ways
12. The Skeezix Dilemma
Silly childhood game - Uncle Wiggily
I cower in abject horror
Approaching space number 109
Home of the gaunt and haggard shell of the Skeezix
The emaciated figure
Harboring the greed of a thousand
Invading, thriving, ascaris whittles away
The self confidence of young minds
Casting doubt that they will
Ever reach the finish
To see for themselves
The segacious Uncle Wiggily
His mission now is complete
The arboreal king of misery and woe
Skeezix reposes high on a knotty forest crag
And the child still tries his best to
Stay in the game
But with insufficient, no volition
Plotted course of demolition
Goes through all the motions
Musing caveat emptor and
A predetermined failure
He draws a card and all his fears come true
Advance to 109
That's what you have to do
When Mr. Skeezix becomes Mr. Jones
Or you, or me
Just think of what it does to wreck
A child of two or three
They know and feel much more than
We will give them credit for
And all they want in life from you
Is love and nothing more
When painful eyes begin to cringe
When you walk through the door
Remember children are a gift of love
Sent from the Lord
13. Ark of Suffering
You think it's alright to destroy God's creation
They don't have a voice
So who cares how we're treating them here
If you read His word
You should know that He blessed them
I know your defense is to say:
"God said dominate them"
Do you think "dominate" means to kill just for sport
Wear the fur from their backs
Train them for circus acts
Take our pets to be gassed once their "cute" age has passed
Don't you see in their eyes how they trust us?
But man in his sin
Turns that trust into horrible pain
When God says to man:
"Give account of your life's work"
We must be prepared to reply:
"Your creation I loved"
Locked behind steel cages
Forced to take drugs we've made
Cut them up just to show
What we already know
Before they die
Who will hear them cry?
14. The Hand Trembler
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