ALPHA CUE

Alpha Cue and Swoon are almost always grouped together, but I've decided to give each album its own entry in order to reduce the overall bulk of the postings.

Tracklist:

1. Summer Virus Night
2. A Slap In The Face
3. Friendly Manifesto
4. Connoisseurs Of Lightning
5. What Rubs Up To You
6. Beguine
7. Cerebral Dance
8. Verbal Blunder
9. Tropical Depression
10. Seven Song

Tracks in bold have been transcribed, the rest are coming soon.
Italicized words are unclear -- feel free to post corrections or additions!

_________________________


Summer Virus Night

This velvet feels like being drunk, mixed with lazy flower with big stink.
Pumped and coddled (cuddled?) and then disassembled,
The last petal falling on she loves me not. I sever myself from the world
With a fever which I blame on you and your crazy mouth,
Which can kiss my heat away tonight, now that the moon has entered the sky
And is outing [??] dogs rub their ribs against fences and cats pulsate like [?]s
Yowling with desire for doo-wop.
What's inside me is rampant, wanting ice-bath or alcohol sponge,
Something to extract and into a test tube. Glowing in the dark like Madame Curie's lover.
Nothing will end, the [???].
What's inside me is rampant, wanting ice-bath or alcohol sponge,
Something to extract and into a test tube. Glowing in the dark like Madame Curie's lover.


A Slap In The Face

Night descends upon the city like some rusty red woman and rubs its breasts in your face,
Reminding you that you're not gorgeous or immortal or swell.
Reminding you that it's September, and you haven't been bad enough to go to hell like you planned
When spring erupted and bit your cheek like some rabid diva.
This evening sky was made for you, wraps itself around you like a luxury stole
And yanks you through the streets as if you were a stilettoed girl late for church.
Fear that you can set things on fire [unclear] inside you as if it wants to dance,
And the smell of roses is so far away, and windows are shut so we can't hear your yelling,
And those things called trees are turning colors, dying a pretty, pretty death.
That sweat we're making is not of hard work, or heat, or sex, or the desire for much,
But of nerves that buzz beneath your skin.

Friendly Manifesto

We girls, we have to mature, create an instant past, a hairline incision
Into what was once called [?]. They say we'd lose our heads if they weren't attached
To our spines by ganglia and nerve tissue and stuff called effervescence. Because it's pink.
Oh, it's not enough to be ringmasters, bachelorettes of knowledge, [?] queens of the world.
A sign must be put on to study, to be ignored like that doghouse on fire out back.
Father once warned me that I'd explode, and I did. It was a painful way to spend a Saturday,
But I think it built character. You, you'd do it too, and hide everything that's [?] be inside
Until it becomes a secret known by you, only by you and a soft sweet liver.


Connoisseurs Of Lightning

It never thunders in Paris. I can see us there, small and polite,
Waiting for someone to offer us a cigarette, waiting for a street child to pick us at random
Present us with a flower. A tulip, perhaps. So out of context.
Each time we enter buildings, we are greeted by groups of violinists who adore us.
And we love it well.
How wonderful it would be. No time for revolutions, we'd laid down our guns.
Too much fluff to enjoy, and we do.
No time to think of dead parents, no time to write our own epitaphs,
Which in any case would read: "Had lots of fun. Thanks."
We would glow and sweeten the air, more brilliant than any Manhattan neon.
Oh, Paris, Paris, I know you're there. I know you're there like heaven is there.
Not very lonely. Not dying to see me.


What Rubs Up To You

It is silent. You see some kind of pretend debt caught up to you.
A universal language causing holes in sidewalks where flowers pop up.
It is not yet spring and already you're snide, although nothing old is looking up to you.
Talk to me about this bleached winter, all I know is that miserable fish are swimming
In the frosty lake and your lungs are very warm.
You've forgotten too many things. Barflies have gathered and are singing.
I have too many hearts when you're looking at me. Remember, pause, then go away.
You'll be happy, oh so happy, doing so.


Beguine

We all want to see the sight that makes us goofy with desire.
[??] wearing a bikini made out of an American flag. A gun, a car, a nun.
The skyline of Manhattan collapsing or some very pretty art damage.
A movie star, a Spanish fly, a shining eye, a mirror. Whatever it is, it will impassion us.
It will impassion us like a big fat [???] impassion us. Like a lovely war (roar?) can impassion us.
Or like an African [?]. Like a six-pack, like Andy Warhol's rolodex, it will impassion us.
And then we want it to dangle before us like some crazy constellation,
'Cause we know that if it lingers long enough, we might just get to keep it all to ourselves.

Cerebral Dance

Verbal Blunder

No slip of the tongue could cause this misunderstanding
It's your head and its wicked working that's led you to this awkward pause
After blurting out that vicious clause, which brings those [?]s
Which say, "Drop dead."
No slip of the tongue could cause this misunderstanding;
It's your head that controls your flapping jaws and dictates all those things you've said.
Don't claim that your meaning was misread or twisted by perception flaws,
Because no slip of the tongue could cause this misunderstanding.
It's your head.

Tropical Depression

I'm tired and hungry and about to get wet. Today has been too tight, too heavy,
And it's not getting thinner with this downpour. Everyone runs for cover,
Avoiding the bookstore and lingerie boutique.
We all huddle in the coffeeshop and it seems like it's forever.
I see a mother hit her son for the fourth time since my cigarette's been lit.
She's hitting him because he won't stop crying, and he won't stop crying because she's hitting him.
We're a hundred miles south of [?] already, our sweat licking our skin.
[?]ing our clothes in one of those ugly silk fabric kisses.
We're a hundred miles south of [?] already and we know it's not gonna get much better.
Everyone is crabby dealing with this heat. They're [?] each other
And everything else that's out of their control. And now, the wind is picking up.
No, forget an umbrella. I'm going out there, head naked. Let the typhoon take me somewhere else,
Somewhere clear and cool and void of any emotion.

Seven Song

Last night, the tide was high.
Seven women dressed in white swayed seven different ways (waves?)

While a boy at the piano played a pack of hearts. We were tired of being mild.
We wanted tornado, our lips painted red.
Was it the night that was barking? Only the Buddhists were sleeping, dreaming
Of the Orient [??] itself.
Seven naked boys carry seven yellow candles into the darkened fields
While I stole a box of father's hair and set it to the wind.
We arrived at the party dressed as water, eyes slick-red from thinking,
Waiting for a nervous twitch, a steady hum inside our bones.
We were tired of being mild. We wanted tidal wave, hurricane [line unclear] 
Seven nets were cast into the water, pulling seven older women up (out?)
Bruised faces in the moonlight. Was your (her?) sister among them? 
The one with the slender hands; the one that wanted nothing but music all day long.
Bowls of water set out for the deadpan-faced gangsters in the funeral home.
The casket flipped over, the corpse on the floor. We were tired of being mild.
The ominous blur nestled in the motor [?] at sea and obscured.
Seven cannons were shot cross town to honor seven modern lovers,
While a sailor sung a hymn to [??] our shoes.
A burst of pigeons pierced the heavy summer air, a burst of gunfire.
Dressed in bullets, we were tired of being mild! We wanted disaster, the taste of [?]
Pumping [?] into our throats.
Seven oily children spoke in seven different tongues.
And they slipped out of church, backdoor, with handkerchiefs in pockets
Just enough to gather one before the eyes 
[Multiple unclear lines]
Where through the window she is there. Faces tame as milk, we were, we were cooking,
Our blood thick inside our veins.
Seven falling stars pierced seven empty arms and the saddle caught on fire.
[Unclear line]
A harnessed giggle, an eerie caress longed to be exiled,
To be the thought of the pearl gleaming.