The song lyrics were written by the band Van Halen, as they were asked to write a song for the 1979 movie "Over the Edge" starring Matt Dillon. The movie (and the lyrics, although more obliquely) are about bored, rebellious youth with nothing better to do than get into trouble. If you see the movie, these lyrics will make more sense. It's a great movie if you grew up in the 70s/80s you'll definitely remember some of these characters from your own life. Fun fact, after writing the song, Van Halen decided not to let the movie use it.
Oh, where is your inflammatory writ?
Your text that would incite a light, "Be lit"?
Our music-deserving, devotion-unswerving
Cry "Do I deserve her?" with unflagging fervor
Well no we do not if we cannot get over it
But what's it mean when suddenly we're spent?
Tell me true!
Ambition came and reared its head and went
Far from you!
Even mollusks have weddings though solemn and leaden
But you dirge for the dead and take no jam on your bread
Just a supper of salt and a waltz through your empty bed
And all at once it came to me
And I wrote him hunched 'till four-thirty
But that vestal light
It burns out with the night
In spite of all the time that we spend on it:
On one bedraggled ghost of a sonnet!
While outside the wild boars root
Without bending a bough underfoot
O it breaks my heart; I don't know how they do't
So don't ask me!
And as for my inflammatory writ?
Well I wrote it and I was not inflamed one bit
Advice from the master derailed that disaster
He said "Hand that pen over to me, poetaster!"
While across the great plains, keening lovely & awful
Ululate the lost Great American Novels
An unlawful lot, left to stutter and freeze, floodlit
(But at least they didn't run, to their undying credit)
Your text that would incite a light, "Be lit"?
Our music-deserving, devotion-unswerving
Cry "Do I deserve her?" with unflagging fervor
Well no we do not if we cannot get over it
But what's it mean when suddenly we're spent?
Tell me true!
Ambition came and reared its head and went
Far from you!
Even mollusks have weddings though solemn and leaden
But you dirge for the dead and take no jam on your bread
Just a supper of salt and a waltz through your empty bed
And all at once it came to me
And I wrote him hunched 'till four-thirty
But that vestal light
It burns out with the night
In spite of all the time that we spend on it:
On one bedraggled ghost of a sonnet!
While outside the wild boars root
Without bending a bough underfoot
O it breaks my heart; I don't know how they do't
So don't ask me!
And as for my inflammatory writ?
Well I wrote it and I was not inflamed one bit
Advice from the master derailed that disaster
He said "Hand that pen over to me, poetaster!"
While across the great plains, keening lovely & awful
Ululate the lost Great American Novels
An unlawful lot, left to stutter and freeze, floodlit
(But at least they didn't run, to their undying credit)
Lyrics submitted by Mopnugget, edited by caio101008
Inflammatory Writ Lyrics as written by Joanna Newsom
Lyrics © ROUGH TRADE PUBLISHING
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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