Darkest Hour

The Light at the Edge of the World

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The Light at the Edge of the World Lyrics

After the torchlight red on sweaty faces
After the frosty silence in the gardens
After the agony in stony places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and palace and reverberation
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
He who was living is now dead
We who were living are now dying
With a little patience

Here is no water but only rock
Rock and no water and the sandy road
The road winding above among the mountains
Which are mountains of rock without water
If there were water we should stop and drink
Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
If there were only water amongst the rock
Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit
There is not even silence in the mountains

Submitted by

applequeso On Jul 29, 2007

With A Thousand Words To Say But One

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AppleQueso

Submitter

2007-07-29 09:17:23

5 Meanings

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by AppleQueso

18y ago

you know, the spoken part to this song is an excerpt from T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land." Just go look it up and read it and you'll get it COMPLETELY right.

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by tigger0jk

12y ago

The rap genius page gives a bit of a breakdown into what that part of the poem is about - I'm sure there's better analysis elsewhere but that format is good for this use.

http://poetry.rapgenius.com/Ts-eliot-the-waste-land-annotated#note-1643585