Coil - Batwings (A Limnal Hymn) lyrics

(The key to joy is disobedience There is no guilt and there is no shame) A moon-piece to fetch up the golden cup A snow-piece to avoid the great heat of the sun Is kept in the night and by the light of the moon An ice-piece so as they seem forever fallen A night-piece of the dismal supper and strange entertainment A rare chance-piece, a handsome piece of deformity The skin of a snake bred out of the spinal marrow of a man With stones and illegible inscriptions found about great ruins Pictures of three remarkable steeples, or towers Built purposely awry, so as they seem eternally tipping and falling A transcendent perfume made of the richest odorates Kept in a box of translucent scale A gla** of spirits made of ethereal salt, hermetically sealed up Kept continually in quicksilver, of so volatile a nature That it will scarcely endure the light And therefore only shown in winter Or by the light of a carbuncle, or a firefly And batwings And batwings And batwings sing this limnal hymn A wideness opening and closing to keep the darkness sealed within To keep the darkness sealed within To keep the darkness sealed within To keep the darkness sealed within A moon-piece to fetch up the golden cup The singing that follows is not in English. When this song was played at John Balance's funeral service, Peter Christopherson described it as "a language that only he knows"