When all the worst we fear lets fall its weight When the gyre widens on and when the wave breaks When St. Peter loses cool and bars the Gates When Atlas acts the maggot, makes his arms shake When the birds are heard again in their singing Once atrocity is hoarse from voicing shame When the earth is trembling on some new beginning With the same sweet shock of when Adam first came Be, be, be, be, be Be as you've always been Be, be, be, be, be Be as you've always been (lover, be good to me) Be as you've always been (lover, be good to me) Be like the love that discovered sin (lover, be good to me) That freed the first man and will do so again And lover, be good to me (lover, be good to me) Be the hopeful feeling when Eden was lost (lover, be good to me) That's been deaf to our laughter since the master was crossed (lover, be good to me) Which side of the wall really suffers that cost Oh lover, be good to me When the man who gives the order Is born next time around on the boat sent back When the bodies starving at the border Are on TV giving people the sack
Oh, when the sea rises to meet us Oh when there's nothing left for you and I to do Oh when there's nobody upstairs to receive us When I have no kind words left, love for you now Be, be, be, be, be Be as you've always been Be, be, be, be, be Be as you've always been (lover, be good to me) Be love in its disrepute (lover, be good to me) That scorches the hillside and salts every root (lover, be good to me) And watches the slowing and starving of troops And lover, be good to me (lover, be good to me) Be there and just as you stand (lover, be good to me) Or be like the rose that you hold in your hand (lover, be good to me) That will grow bold in a barren and desolate land And lover, be good to me (lover, be good to me) Love won't you be Love won't you be Be as you've always been? Love won't you be Love won't you be Be as you've always been? Love won't you be Love won't you be Be as you've always been? Love won't you be Love won't you be Be as you've always been? (Lover, be good to me)