I (The Festival) Newly dumped from out a cage The organ plays her out on stage Youve paid

the grinder, watch it dance A drunken monkey in a trance

This creature was her own design From houses stained with cherry wine Her hands had almost reached the stars But cradled pints in London bars

We tried to help her long ago She simply told us, no, no, no Paraded round her broken chains A tour de force with no restrains

So what to do? She made her choice Just buy her records, praise her voice; But there she was, the front page news A pissed-up clown who sang the blues

A lifeless body, out the grave The ice cube in a vodka wave The songs became a droning slur She drowned in tides that turned on her

Our brown-eyed girl was shot to dust By raging bulls fuelled by disgust The reaper watched with bated breath And salivated at her death

II (The Hangover) When daybreak kissed the gates of the tower The blemished princess slept in her bed The flowers had bloomed in this summer storm But one Camden rose had lost its last leaf; In the afternoon gloom a black hole exploded Not with a bang but a stifled whimper Shadowing sunbeams, eclipsing the clouds And a mourning light which she never again saw

A raven-haired songbird lay silent this day So the audience took wait and echoed her voice The needles sting was dulled by great expectation This song was completed; recorded and sold; Barring a B-side and no crescendo Her quarters were tied with news headlines Like toilet paper tossed by mechanical paws, That fed on a prophecy, written long ago

Her silhouetted form was forever on show

By a blinding spark from a pale flashbulb, Striking lightning from walking clouds With itchy trigger fingers and thumb-printed lenses, Torn skin from bone, ripped heart from soul; The spirit was left, a crumbled ash, Soured by compulsion, desire and fame; Her portrait was scarred by graffiti artists, Smudging her smile with scarlet spray-paint

In the foggy hum they waited in line Slow suits in skullcaps gathering to mourn Pursued by flowered frocks and black panda eyes Armies of skinny jeans with fedoras for helmets Marching with flowers in Jack Daniels holsters; But this was a war that had already been lost These soldiers are princes who arrived too late For the Mona Lisa was tarnished and tossed in the fire Orphaning opinions, all searching for blame

This rose was blistered by the ways of fate Her vessel was empty, nothing was left This throwback was thrown back to the halls of habit Left to her devices, alone with her friends

III (The Aftermath) There stood the shadow The body of pain, Loosening its grip on the slackening rein A message was sent Of which we all learned A future was born and the history burned

There stood the hope The body of aid, Showing the roads that people had swayed A foundation was built To show them the course A handle of hope, of which shell endorse

There stood the sound The body of soul, Melodies of warmth that continue to roll A mirror of heartbreak To which we all weep A beautiful sadness that sings us to sleep

There stood the girl The body of fame, Picasso art in a cardboard frame

Absorbed by love She vented her heart Our anarchic angel, we dearly depart. Jools Evelyn