The Carny Lyrics

And no one saw the carny go The weeks flew by Until they moved on the show Leaving his caravan behind
It was parked out on the south east ridge And as the company crossed the bridge With the first rain filling the bone dry river bed It shone, just so, upon the edge Away, away, we're sad, they say
Dog boy, Atlas, Mandrake, the geeks, the hired hands There was not one among them That did not cast an eye behind In the hope that the carny would return to his own kind
The carny left behind a horse, so skin and bone That he named Sorrow And it was a shallow unmarked grave That the old nag was laid In the then parched meadow
And it was the dwarves who were Given the task of digging the ditch And laying the nag's carcass in the ground While boss Bellini, waved his smoking pistol around Saying "The nag is dead meat, we can't afford to carry dead weight"
The whole company standing about Not making a sound And turning to dwarves perched on the enclosure gate The boss says "Bury this lump of crow bait"
And then the rain came thundering down Everybody runnin' for their wagons Tyin' all the canvas flaps down The mangy cats crawlin' in ther cages The bird-girl flappin' and squawkin' around
[ From: http://www.metrolyrics.com/the-carny-lyrics-nick-cave-the-bad-seed.html ] The whole valley reekin' of wet beast Wet beast and rotten hay Freak and brute creation All packed up and on their way
The three dwarves peerin' from their wagon's hind Moses says to Noah, "We shoulda dug a deeper one" Their grizzled faces like dyin' moons Still dirty from the diggin' done
And Charlie, the eldest of the three said "I guess the carny ain't gonna show" And they were silent for a spell Wishin' they had done a better job of burying Sorrow
And the company passed from the valley Into a higher ground The rain beat on the ridge and on the meadow And on the mound
Until nothing was left, nothing left at all Except the body of Sorrow That rose in time To float upon the surface of the eaten soil
And a murder of crows did circle round First one, then the others flapping blackly down And the carny's van still sat upon the edge Tilting slowly as the firm ground turned to sludge
And the rain it hammered down And the rain it hammered down And the rain it hammered down And the rain it hammered down
And no one saw the carny go And no one saw the carny go And no one saw the carny go I say it's funny how things go