John Cale - There Was A Saviour

Words: Dylan Thomas

There was a saviour
Rarer than radium,
Commoner than water, crueler than truth;
Children kept from the sun
Assembled at his tongue
To hear the golden note turn in a groove,
Prisoners of wishes locked their eyes
In the jails and studies of his keyless smiles.

The voice of children says
From a lost wilderness There was calm to be done in his safe unrest
When hindering man hurt
Man, animal or bird
We hid our fears in the murdering breath,
Silence, silence to do, when the earth grew loud,
In lairs and asylums of the tremendous shout.


There was glory to hear
In the churches of his tears,
Under his downy arm you sighed as he struck,
O you who could not cry
On to the ground when a man died