Artist: Jethro Tull Album: Heavy Horses {1978}

Muscled, black with steel-green eye
Swishing through the rye grass
With thoughts of mouse and apple pie
Tail balancing at half-mast
And the mouse police never sleeps
Lying in the cherry tree

Savage bed foot-warmer
Of purest feline ancestry
Look out little furry folk
He's the all-night working cat
Eats but one in every ten
Leaves the others on the mat
And the mouse police never sleeps
Waiting by the cellar door
Window-box town crier
Birth and death registrar

With claws that rake a furrow red
Licensed to mutilate
From warm milk on a lazy day
To dawn patrol on hungry hate
No, the mouse police never sleeps
Climbing on the ivy
Windy roof-top weathercock
Warm-blooded night on a cold tile

The mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps
The mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps
The mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps
The mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps
The mouse police never sleeps, the mouse police never sleeps, the mouse

I'll make love to you in all good places
Under black mountains, in open spaces
By deep brown rivers that slither darkly
Through far marches where the blue hare races
Come with me to the Winged Isle
Northern father's western child
Where the dance of ages is playing still
Through far marches of acres wild

I'll make love to you in narrow side streets
With shuttered windows and crumbling chimneys
Come with me to the weary town
Discos silent under tiles
That slide from roof-tops, scatter softly
On concrete marches of acres wild

By red bricks pointed with cement fingers
Flaking damply from sagging shoulders
Come with me to the Winged Isle
Northern father's western child
Where the dance of ages is playing still
Through far marches of acres wild

Keep your eyes open and prick up your ears
Rehearse your loudest cry
There's folk out there who would do you harm
So, I'll sing you no lullaby

There's a lock on the window, there's a chain on the door
And a big dog in the hall
But there's dragons and beasties out there in the night
To snatch you if you fall

So, come out fighting with your rattle in hand, thrust and parry, light
A match to catch the devil's eye, bring a cross of fire to the fight
And let no sleep bring false relief from the tension of the fray
Come wake the dead with the scream of life, do battle with ghosts at play
And gather your toys at the call-to-arms and swing your big bear down
Upon our necks when we come to set you sleeping safe and sound
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries
And little birds can't fly, so keep an open eye
It's as well we tell no lie, so, I'll sing you no lullaby

It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries
And little birds can't fly, so keep an open eye
It's as well we tell no lie, so, I'll sing you no lullaby

Keep your eyes open and prick up your ears
Rehearse your loudest cry
There's folk out there who would do you harm
So, I'll sing you no lullaby

There's a lock on the window, there's a chain on the door
And a big dog in the hall
But there's dragons and beasties out there in the night
To snatch you if you fall

So, come out fighting with your rattle in hand, thrust and parry, light
A match to catch the devil's eye, bring a cross of fire to the fight
And let no sleep bring false relief from the tension of the fray
Come wake the dead with the scream of life, do battle with ghosts at play
And gather your toys at the call-to-arms and swing your big bear down
Upon our necks when we come to set you sleeping safe and sound
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries
And little birds can't fly, so keep an open eye
It's as well we tell no lie, so, I'll sing you no lullaby
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries
And little birds can't fly, so keep an open eye
It's as well we tell no lie, so, I'll sing you no lullaby

Oh, the leaded window opened to move the dancing candle flame
And the first moths of summer suicidal came, oh, suicidal came
And a new breeze chattered in its May-bud tenderness
Sending water-lilies sailing as she turned to get undressed
And the long night awakened and we soared on powdered wings
Circling our tomorrows in the wary month of Spring
Chasing shadows, slipping in the magic lantern slide
Creatures of the candle on a night-light-ride
Dipping and weaving, flutter through the golden needle's eye
In our haystack madness, butterfly-stroking on a Spring-tide high, oh, on a Spring-tide high

"Life's too long," as the Lemming said
As the candle burned and the moths were wed
And we'll all burn together as the wick grows higher
Before the candle's dead

Oh, the leaded window opened to move the dancing candle flame
And the first moths of summer suicidal came, oh, suicidal came
To join in the worship of the light that never dies
In a moment's reflection of two moths spinning in her eyes

Spine-tingling railway sleepers
Sleepy houses lying four-square and firm
Orange beams divide the darkness
Rumbling fit to turn the waking worm
Sliding through Victorian tunnels
Where green moss oozes from the pores
Dull echoes from the wet embankments
Battlefield allotments, fresh open sores

In late night commuter madness
Double-locked black briefcase on the floor
Like a faithful dog with master
Sleeping in the draught beside the carriage door
To each journeyman, his own home-coming
Cold supper nearing with each station stop
Frosty flakes on empty platforms
Fireside slippers waiting - flip, flop

Journeyman night-tripping on the late fantastic
Too late to stop for tea at Gerard's Cross
And hear the soft shoes on the footbridge shuffle
As the wheels turn biting on the midnight frost

On the late commuter special
Carriage lights that flicker, fade and die
Howling into hollow blackness
Dusky diesel shudders in full cry
Down redundant morning papers
Abandon crosswords with a cough
Stationmaster in his wisdom
Told the guard to turn the heating off

Journeyman night-tripping on the late fantastic
Too late to stop for tea at Gerard's Cross
And hear the soft shoes on the footbridge shuffle
As the wheels turn biting on the midnight frost

I chase your every footstep and I follow every whim
When you call the tune I'm ready to strike up the battle hymn
My lady of the meadows, my comber of the beach
You've thrown the stick for your dog's trick but it's floating out of reach
The long road is a rainbow and the pot of gold lies there
So, slip the chain and I'm off again, you'll find me everywhere
Cos I'm a rover

As the robin craves the summer to hide his smock of red
I need the pillow of your hair in which to hide my head
I'm simple in my sadness, resourceful in remorse
Then I'm down straining at the lead, holding on a windward course
The long road is a rainbow and the pot of gold lies there
So, slip the chain and I'm off again, you'll find me everywhere
Cos I'm a rover

Strip me from the bundle of balloons at every fair
Colorful and carefree, designed to make you stare
But I'm lost and I'm losing the thread that holds me down
And I'm up hot and rising in the lights of every town
The long road is a rainbow and the pot of gold lies there
So, slip the chain and I'm off again, you'll find me everywhere
Cos I'm a rover

Smile your little smile
Take some tea with me awhile
Brush away that black cloud from your shoulder
Twitch your whiskers, feel
That you're really real
Another tea time, another day older

Puff warm breath on your tiny hands
You wish you were a man
Who every day can turn another page
Behind your glass you'll sit and look
At my ever-open book
One brown mouse sitting in a cage

Do you wonder if I really care for you
Am I just the company you keep
Which one of us exercises on the old treadmill
Who hides his head, pretending to sleep

Smile your little smile
Take some tea with me awhile
Brush away that black cloud from your shoulder
Twitch your whiskers, feel
That you're really real
Another tea time, another day older

Smile your little smile
Take some tea with me awhile
And every day we'll turn another page
Behind your glass we'll sit and look
At our ever-open book
One brown mouse sitting in a cage
One brown mouse sitting in a cage
One brown mouse sitting in a cage

Iron-clad feather-feet pounding the dust, an October's day towards evening
Sweat embossed veins standing proud to the plough, salt on a deep chest, seasoning
Last of the line at an honest day's toil turning the deep sod under
Flint at the fetlock, chasing the bone, flies at the nostrils plunder
The Suffolk, the Clydesdale, the Percheron Vie, with the Shire on his feathers, floating
Hauling soft timber into the dusk, to bed on a warm straw, coating

Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free
Now, you're down to the few and there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way

Let me find you a filly for your proud stallion seed to keep the old line going
And we'll stand you abreast at the back of the woods behind the young trees growing
To hide you from eyes that mock at your girth - you're eighteen hands at the shoulder
And one day when the oil barons have all dripped dry and the nights are seen to draw colder
They'll beg for your strength, your gentle power, your noble grace and your bearing
And you'll strain once again to the sound of the gulls in the wake of the deep plough, sharing

Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free
Now, you're down to the few and there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way

Standing like tanks on the brow of the hill, up into the cold wind facing
In stiff battle harness, chained to the world against the low sun racing
Bring me a wheel of oaken wood, a rein of polished leather
A heavy horse and a tumbling sky, brewing heavy weather

Bring a song for the evening, clean brass to flash the dawn
Across these acres, glistening like dew on a carpet lawn
In these dark towns folk lie sleeping as the heavy horses thunder by
To wake the dying city with the living horseman's cry

At once the old hands quicken, bring pick and wisp and curry comb
Thrill to the sound of all the heavy horses coming home
Iron-clad feather-feet pounding the dust, an October's day towards evening
Sweat embossed veins standing proud to the plough, salt on a deep chest, seasoning
Bring me a wheel of oaken wood, a rein of polished leather
A heavy horse and a tumbling sky, brewing heavy weather

Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free
Now, you're down to the few and there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way
Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free
Now, you're down to the few and there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way
Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free
Now, you're down to the few and there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way
Heavy horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding, slipping and sliding free

Good morning weathercock, how�d you fare last night
Did the cold wind bite you, did you face up to the fright
When the leaves spin from October and whip around your tail
Did you shake from the blast and did you shiver through the gale

Give us direction, the best of goodwill
Put us in touch with fair winds
Sing to us softly, hum evening�s song
Tell us what the blacksmith has done for you

Do you simply reflect changes in the patterns of the sky
Or is it true to say the weather heeds the twinkle in your eye
Do you fight the rush of winter and hold snowflakes at bay
Do you lift the dawn sun from the fields and help him on his way

Good morning weathercock, make this day bright
Put us in touch with your fair winds
Sing to us softly, hum evening's song
Point the way to better days we can share with you

Good morning weathercock, make this day bright
Put us in touch with your fair winds
Sing to us softly, hum evening's song
Point the way to better days we can share with you