Well that’s it for another week and we leave you dear reader with a new release of an old song by Josh Ritter. Ritter wrote on his Facebook last week: “All that I knew, as I started writing Theophany, was that I wanted to write a song about Power and Freedom. These days, Power comes in many forms, from many sources, and we often feel like driven leaves before them all, our Freedom stripped, our insignificance obvious. But what I found in my song, buried beneath Washington DC, was a power that wanted freedom as much as I did, and in our moment of meeting, we both found what we needed.” He continued: “I recorded this song a while back, but given the world we are living in, I thought now was a good time to give it a wider release.” We’re reproduced the lyrics in their entirety here:
I was new to the capital city so perhaps
That’s why I was chosen to be given the map
Or perhaps it was because the place where I worked
Meant that I wasn’t just some other jerk
Either way though, there it was, one day after lunch
A map in an envelope, there with a bunch
Of mail and other stuff there at my desk
With my name in old cursive, no return address
The map of the capital city was clear
And a dot marked the spot whеre it said ‘You Are Herе’
But an X marked another spot down a few blocks
So I got out my notebook and I took a walk
Of course there was nothing for me to expect
But I write for the paper so I go where I’m led
And this lead it’d led me to a boarded up space
‘Tween a convenience store and a foot massage place
With my pocketed notebook, my flashlight in my teeth
I stooped to the ground and I crawled underneath
And into the dark ’til it swallowed me up
I crawled downwards and downwards towards I didn’t know what
‘Til after what felt like a mile, maybe more
The ground opened up into a vast marble floor
And a vast marble ceiling arched high and away
Far up into shadow where the real world lay
And there in the middle of the vast marble floor
Was a thing unlike anything I’d seen before
A rotating spiraling mist made of lights
That had something like wings made of something like eyes
And it knew I was there because how could it not
And as it read my mind I tasted its thoughts
And I felt every mask that I ever wore drop
And I knew in that moment I was looking at God
But not the God I’d read about, or had been taught
Not some almighty, vengeful, beneficent God
This God had been humbled or diminished or both
And whatever it once was now tied to a post
And as I read its mind or whatever it’s called
It told me of how they’d locked it in the vault
It had come from a place far over the waves
Before that, a place that did not have a name
But like bread into body, water to wine
There were those who could use it to turn wrong to right
So they used it for all the things God is used for
For Second Amendments and new holy wars
And helping the strong so that they’ll feed the weak
Protecting the mighty that they might shepherd the meek
And when people get shot and folks say they care
They need something to go through the thoughts and the prayers
And so they had used it, again and again
And with its moral authority each time they’d win
And in fear of escapes and in hopes just to keep
The God to themselves they had buried it deep
Still they feared it less than just some common ghost
And whatever it once was now tied to a post
And then came the letter, and then I arrived
Looking down on the ground at the rope loosely tied
Oh, to have been trapped here for hundreds of years
Fed on requests and watered with tears
When like all wild things it deserved to be free
To live on its own, and maybe then so could we
So light burned my face as I worked out the knot
And the wind from the howling of wings was so hot
That I thought I might die, ’til the rope fell away
And I fell to the ground, and that’s where I stayed
When I awoke in the darkness, alive and alone
The God once possessed ‘neath the city had flown
So I picked up my flashlight and left as I came
Back out on the street, it had started to rain.
Take care, don’t forget Palestine and keep fighting the fascists. See you next week.
