Sting - The Soul Cages lyrics

The boy child is locked in the fisherman's yard There's a bloodless moon where the ocean died A shoal of nightstars hang fire in the nets And the chaos of cages where the crayfish lie Where is the fisherman, where is the goat? Where is the keeper in his carrion coat? Eclipse on the moon when the dark bird flies Where is the child with his father's eyes? There are the soul cages These are the soul cages He's the king of the ninth world The twisted son of the fog bells toll In each and every lobster cage A tortured human soul These are the souls of broken factories The subject slaves of the broken crown The dead accounting of old guilty promises These are the souls of the broken town These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages 'I have a wager' the brave child spoke The fisherman laughed, though disturbed at the joke 'You will drink what I drink but you must equal me And if the drink leaves me standing, A soul shall go free' 'I have here a cask of most magical wine A vintage that blessed every ship in the line It's wrung from the blood of the sailor's who died Young white bodies adrift in the tide' 'And what's in it for me my pretty young thing? Why should I whistle, when the caged bird sings? If you lose a wager with the king of the sea You'll spend the rest of forever in the cage with me' These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages A body lies open in the fisherman's yard Like the side of a ship where the iceberg rips One less soul in the soul cages One last curse on the fisherman's lips These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages These are the soul cages Swim to the light Swim to the light He dreamed of the ship on the sea It would carry his father and he To a place they could never be found To a place far away from this town A Newcastle ship without coals They would sail to the island of souls