The boy child is locked in the fisherman’s yard

There’s a bloodless moon where the oceans die

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?



These 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 the 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



“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 sailors 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



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



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