Visitation at Fort Horn lyrics

Behind the walls where heat lightning falls

On five-starred gnat-faced princess

The buffalo man shoots at tin cans

Turns and shouts, "Children, blow your bridges"

In death row halls where dust men stall

For time's an enemy and a friend

At night, jackals crawl from the cracks in the walls

Salvation is never spoken

Morning sickness breaks the garrison gates

The cavalry cries for treason

The soldier strokes his pony and goes to shine the captain's sword

In this young boy's eyes lie reason

But then the sergeant burst in, says

"Captain, I caught a prisoner, Captain. A prisoner, what ho?"

The Captain looks up and says, "Let her go"

"But Captain, she commands the lightships that patrol the sea around the rainbow tips

Whose bagpipes wail unbroken

She haunts the night and the dawn and the light

On her sounds and words, your cavalry's choking"

The captain says, "Have no fear, boys, for what you hear

Because danger can't be spoken"

The war wind crackles and I hear the rustle of shackles

From the stockade door bursts Merlin

His eyes red and swollen like they've been pushed into the sun

His robe's aflame and burning

He jumps a horse, tries to get away, but gets caught in his irons

Tangled in his irons, and he falls to the ground, his neck was broken

His spirit rises high into the western sky

The magician lies an empty token

The sergeant walks over and kicks his body and says

"Captain, he's dead, uh, I think he's dead, uh, what should we do with him?"

The captain says, "Hang him

For those live moments on this earth are well spent

And I can see his body sure well bent

It's his magic that must be broken"

And now night cradles low

The penniless weed plays raw filth in the captain's corner

With anvils spread wide, the captain glides

Each blow to scare her, not hurt her

She spits with truth at the captain's boots

But he holds his rage suspended

The sergeant comes stinking of soldiers' gin

And cries, "Captain, the storm, she blows unending"

Oh, and the lightning cracked

And the sky was hacked by dagger rain, it was torn

And the yard was charged into a raging sea

And the captain ran crazily

For the first time in his life, in the captain's heart fear was born

So the captain storms out on the stoop

Panic strikes, sees Merlin's hung body stretched by the neck

Silhouetted on his door

The sergeant screams, "Captain, look high, look to the sky

Some whirling, swirling emission"

The captain falls to his knees, crying silent pleas

Because he knows, he knows

And he thinks to himself,

"A magician"