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Sing, bird of prey;
Beauty begins at the foot of you. Do you believe the manner?
Gold stainless nail,
Torn through the distance of man
As they regard the summit.
Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.
Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right on over my head.
How does she sing?
Who holds the ring? And ring and you will find me coming.
Cold reigning king,
Hold all the secrets from you
As they produce the movement.
Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.
Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right over the outboard, river,
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time.
dude'ndoodit, dah, d't-d't-dah.
Hold down the window;
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Warm side, the tower;
Green leaves reveal the heart spoken Khatru.
Gold stainless nail,
Torn through the distance of man as they regard the summit.
Cold reigning king,
Shelter the women that sing
As they produce the movement.
River running right on over,
Then over my head.
Outboard, river.
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time,
Suntower, asking,
Cover, lover,
June cast, moon fast,
As one changes,
Heart gold, leaver,
Soul mark, mover,
Christian, changer,
Called out, saviour,
Moon gate, climber,
Turn round, glider.
Beauty begins at the foot of you. Do you believe the manner?
Gold stainless nail,
Torn through the distance of man
As they regard the summit.
Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.
Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right on over my head.
How does she sing?
Who holds the ring? And ring and you will find me coming.
Cold reigning king,
Hold all the secrets from you
As they produce the movement.
Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.
Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right over the outboard, river,
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time.
dude'ndoodit, dah, d't-d't-dah.
Hold down the window;
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Warm side, the tower;
Green leaves reveal the heart spoken Khatru.
Gold stainless nail,
Torn through the distance of man as they regard the summit.
Cold reigning king,
Shelter the women that sing
As they produce the movement.
River running right on over,
Then over my head.
Outboard, river.
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time,
Suntower, asking,
Cover, lover,
June cast, moon fast,
As one changes,
Heart gold, leaver,
Soul mark, mover,
Christian, changer,
Called out, saviour,
Moon gate, climber,
Turn round, glider.
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This is what the song means TO ME (and only to me because it was a time when I had problems accepting that I was a sexual female animal instead of an autistic broken robot), the words are about a girl who lives isolated in a tower who wants to continue to believe that life is sad and depressing, because her parents (Cold reigning king that holds all the secrets from you) told her sex was "animalistic". Sex was the secret. In my case it was my mom. The cold, feelings-are-evil king "shelters the women that sing" ...or want to sing, if they weren't trapped in the ivory tower of intellect.
She sees the summit in the distance (the summit of existence: opening up to boys, doing it, culminating in orgasm).
When puberty happens, she tries desperately to hold down the window to keep out the morning (happiness and enthusiasm and life) that come into view.
It is something that doesn't have a name, but you can call it by a meaningless name, "the khatru". It's the same thing the black monolith represented in 2001: a space odyssey. The "khatru" comes to rescue you when you're in a cold place, even Siberia, and it makes the side of the tower warm as it approaches.
Sex is like a river that she sees coming, a flood that she can't stop, and it runs right over her head, drowning her in it's joy. (Cover, lover). As she feels all of her fear and resistance melt away, she suddenly sees herself climbing the summit, the mountain.
As one changes...
Sex feelings touch her and leave their golden mark on her soul, transforming her into being happy (Heart gold, leaver, Soul mark, mover, changer)
Free of the ivory tower, she is now climbing the mountain summit herself, and as she nears the top, wondering what awaits her there, she feels a burst of hot light from behind her, and she can see its brightness on her hands and the rock she is climbing.
She slowly turns around to face it. She is completely overwhelmed. She steps off the mountaintop, which turns out not to be where her destiny is, but only a place to meet it. Instead of falling, she soars into the sky to meet the light.
Turn round, glider.
The rest of the song is instrumental, and its repeating cycles of happiness and joy are her being fucked for the first time, getting closer and closer to orgasm--the ultimate experience, the peak and the meaning of life. The two-second guitar riff at the very end where three notes repeat very fast is her cumming, when she is absorbed into Eternity, losing her identity as an individual.
Anyone on the ground who is still sad would say that she died (presumably from old age), because we are animals and death is the flip side of sex.
See, before sex evolved, everything lived forever (as very simple animals like jellyfish). They got bigger end bigger and then split into two halves which became two individuals. But shortly after sex evolved, death did too: We have to die so we don't compete for food with our children after they too achieve puberty.
See, I knew this when I was a kid, and I didn't want to feel sex because I didn't want to be part of the cycle and die.
But really, by having sex (and eventually, children), when you lose your individual identity (during orgasm, and then death) you become part of the brilliant, white-hot infinity of never-ending life, which here is called "the heart-spoken, Siberian Khatru".
---================---
...I observe that even after all these years, thinking about the words of Siberian Khatru still makes me cry.
This song's impact on me can not possibly be understated. The images and feelings it engendered made me dedicate my life to preventing other kids, particularly smart ones who think too much, from fearing sex because it's something animals do—like dying.
Yes really.
tiny url dot com slash kanecave
-- faye kane homeless brain
most of which continues to this day to have profound emotional effects on me.
Anderson's stuff is "stream of consciousness", like bluetail --> tailfly. That comes from a song "Blue Tail Fly" which was sung by Burl Ives a lot when Anderson was a kid. "Outboard --> river. Outboard motor links to "river" in his head.
"Heart gold --> leaver --> Soul mark". Someone with a heart of gold leaves a mark on someone else's soul. Maybe. But For sure, Jon didn't want or expect people to sit down and deconstruct his lyrics because they communicate FEELING, not meaning.
Each word or two stands alone as a feeling. A lot of them have to do with freedom and optimisim and flight.
That having been said, his consciousness stream is obviously polluted by the ridiculous mythology he was infected with when he was little. My guess is that Martin Luther was the "christian changer". He caused the protestants to break with the fucked-up catholic church and form their own fucked-up church. I'd bet anything that Anderson is Lutheran.
If that is "shitty" then I wish I could write such "shitty" lyrics like Jon :-)
Beauty begins at the foot of you: foreplay. GOLD STAINLESS NAIL: gold meaning true;stainless meaning pure; nail meaning getting nailed. EVEN SIBERIA GOES THRU THE MOTIONS: yes men and women can copulate no matter how cold or hot it is. HOLD DOWN THE WINDOW: to mean try not to let anyone interrupt love making. BLUETAIL,TAILFLY: well the words tail and fly are in that line - prolly a cold but. RIVER RUNNING RIGHT OVER MY HEAD: well you know which head. FFWing to the end "TURN ROUND, GLIDER", means switch sex positions. simple?
I suppose if I were hungry, it'd obviously be about McDonald's.
And perhaps Bluetail and Tailfly = Birds and the Bees, man and woman, which is also a big theme in the song...
The lyrics always mean something in progressive music... always. And always can have several interpretations. Here is one good of it:
yesfans.com/forum/…
A masterpiece. Thank you YES
Keeping the above in mind and Anderson having written and spoken of the greater understanding of self and, by extension, life that comes from being able to awaken within one's dreams, it does look possible to me that the song title translates to Dream(Siberian) Catcher/Katchur(Khatru), i.e. summer/warm/day/dream/understanding/clarity/awakening.
One of my faves by anyone, EVER.
I would like to take exception to what ColdCat said: "progressive rock tunes largely have no meanings. That is sort of one of the defining rules of progressive rock."
That's a crock, dude! Just because YOU don't understand the meaning, does NOT mean that they have no meaning! (Know what I mean?)
I'm working on my first prog CD right now. And I'm here to tell you that MY friggin lyrics mean something! So do the lyrics of the music I listen to and consider as influential (Band like Rush, Yes, Pink Floyd, ELP, and Porcupine Tree.) The lyrics may be obscure and difficult to unravel sometimes (Hence, the reason for websites such as this one.) But they DO have meaning.