Bear’s Vision of St. Agnes

Barren rocks and sand, Our wooden sculpture hands
Held like a timber hitch, held candles to the sun
Both faint and fading fast, they walked on, windward, kept time with a pocketmouse
Mouths kept mostly shut

[Bear]
Thought broke our silence like a bone

[Fox]
(half-moaned) "You've worn me like an albatross, I've only slowed you down
You could've long traded in your braided crown by now
You could've found that Anabaptist girl you always used to go on about"

[Bear]
As we rode in circles on our bicycles, we walked on balance beams
As the audience cheered for us. We burned like fevers under carriage hats
Hid behind Venetian masks in our human costumes
We stood like statues once in shepherd's check, we'll both be decked in herringbone
Wrapped border drab around already broken ironstone."

[Bear]
"But I've seen these cliffs before, St. Agnes brought her palm branch
To the hospital, looked upward lest the charm had fled from my brother's breathing bed
And when he died I shut his dogtooth violet eyes:
He looked just like me - climb on down and see
They laid him on the rocks below, there'll be enough to fill your cup for days
I'll stay up here and rest
[Aside] We'll fly in straight lines as from carronades
We'll crash like tidal waves, decimate the islands
As our hollowed lumber falls like water, ends where I start
In that tattered rag shop back in Asbury Park.

Look how soon my hands won't move - but if you'll improve, we'll all improve
Look how soon my arms won't move!
Sixty feet and my feet won't move, but if you'll improve, we'll all improve
Forty feet my legs won't move, as you improve we all improve
Fill our den with acorn mast, I'll wake before the salmon pass
Ten feet more and nothing moves."