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AS IF I NEVER WAS AT ALL

After his death, Cinque exposes his humanity as he concedes the regrets of his unfulfilled dreams

I was born black and blue

On the rundown side of town

A running angry child runnin’ wild

Through idle days and hungry nights

The oldest of eight or nine

Held tight by my daddy’s belt

My mama’s dreams dyin’ on the vine

 

The week before I ran away

The circus came to town

I belly-crawled under canvas folds

Into a three ring spectacle

Of daredevils and clowns

 

And above it all

Was a spinning spangled girl

Hanging by her teeth without a net

The thrilling risk to grip or slip

To a certain death

 

In three days time

The carnival was past and gone

With only trampled weeds

Left where it stood

Past and gone

As if it never was at all

 

Stealing down the road

To anywhere away

My resentments gathered in a plan

To take revenge to shake the world 

To kick it back to make it beg

 

Not every man’s ambition

Can be crowned

There will be mountains left unmoved

Horizons lost and never found

Edens never planted

What happens to me now

Now that my tent is folded

My last wagon loaded

And rolled away

What happens to me now

My last show picks up

And closes down

Past and gone

As if it never was at all

As If I Never Was -
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MIDI - New Arrangement 

As If I Never Was - MIDI
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No more the gasping of the crowds

No more little folks and giants

No more the smell of nearby victory

No more the fouled straw of caged lions

 

This cold world’s graves are overflowing

With a hundred thousand million

Unwritten books and unsung songs

Unstaged plays and unrighted wrongs

 

So bury my dreams with my bones

As if I never dreamed at all

Let the strained calliope

That plays for other men, not I

Mock and pass me by

As if I never was at all

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