Baba Brinkman - The Pardoner's Tale lyrics

My story begins at a bar, where three friends
Drink cheap gin and party hard all weekend
These men were riot-starter types
Who spent the better part of their
Money on cards and dice
Livin' the life of loose women and vice
Pickin' fights
Seduced by all seven different types
Of sins, a feeding frenzy of Vengeance
Vanity, Lust, Greed and Envy
Devious energy left them half-insane
Laughing deranged like hyenas at
Their bastard games
As each glass was drained and
Each bet was placed
They set the pace and left
Space for their next mistakes
All excessive waste and drunken rambling
With eager hands trembling
Eventually gambling
Leads to panhandling, But that's the price


You pay to cast the dice, and other appetites
Pay the same sacrifice
While the false assumption
Is they help us function
When really it's just a dungeon
Of self-consumption
In other words, it's not worth it
This world is not perfect
But it gets worse if
Flesh is the only god you worship
As mortal men you
Need more than the sinews in
Your corpse to defend you
But let the story continue
The same as before
Where these three hard-core men
Drink at the bar
Someone came in the door and ordered a beer
And told a sad story they were sorry to hear
Choking on tears, he said, "Death is a thief!
My friend was asleep and
His breath just ceased
May he rest in peace, and never be stressed
I guess people ever need to
Be ready to meet Death!"
And disrespectfully
The three inebriated rioters
Proceeded to curse and debated
The guy's words:
"I've heard, " stated the first
"Enough about Death!
Every town is gripped in
His clutches without rest
What is it about this foe
That's so scary? Please
If an adversary bleeds and breathes
The same air as me
I can bury it! See, fellas, what I'm tellin'
You is: Death is a villain
And the rest is irrelevant
So let's go kill him!"
When he'd said his piece the rest agreed
And the three friends hit the streets
And went to seek their destiny
And provoke a confrontation
In a drunken rage
Hoping Death would come and face them
Their intoxication made them sure
Of their purpose
And fed the infernal furnace
Of their courage, a kernel
Nourished by these three murderous
Wretches in denial
Less than a mile into their quest
To put Death on trial
They met this guy all wrapped in bandages
An old handicapped man, with disadvantages
And the three friends examined
His bleeding flesh
And demanded he tell them how
He was cheating death seeming perplexed
The old man responded with soft words
And said, "I walk the earth like a
Creature God has cursed!
My lot is the worst and
Most desperate place to be
I pray faithfully every day for
Death to take me
Waiting patiently, and someday he will arrive
But in the meantime, until I die
I'm still alive"
In a burst of ill-advised pride, the first
Of the three rioters replied, "This guy
Is a spy
Or worse! I guess Death is his master
And gives him everlasting life forever after
A benevolent benefactor, perhaps
To have protecting you
But nothing gets a confession
Faster than weapons do!"
And stepping to this old
Man with mindless threats
They demanded he tell them where
They could find Death
"Find Death?" laughed the old man
"Perhaps you will
He lives under that tree on that grassy hill"
Ready to kill
With their jagged-edged daggers drawn
The three aggravated braggarts staggered
Up the lawn and without dragging on while
The story is told
Beneath the tree they found a
Bag filled with glorious gold
The hoard was more than
Forty-fold their wildest dreams
And they smiled like demons
Hatching violent schemes
While the steam from their
Previous plan was dissipated
They were so fixated on the gold
It just abated
And the search for death was traded
For work of greater urgency
Now the worst of the three had
The first words to speak and said
"Certainly it seems fortune gave us this gold
To save us from having to work
And slave in the cold
But fortune favours the bold
And to spend this treasure
On endless pleasures, to begin we'd better
Take preventative measures
‘cause if the switch from poor to rich
Is too disproportionate
Then law-enforcement will get
Suspicious how we afforded it
And then we'll pay the price
So let's sit tight and play this right:
See, we'll wait 'til late at night
And if all is not lost
Under the cover of darkness we
Can haul this all off
But for now we'll draw straws
Since we've got a lot of time
And one of us can run off
And buy a bottle of wine"
The others thought the plot was fine
And trusted it's wit
And the youngest among them
Drew the cut stick
And rushed to get booze so
This could be celebrated
As the other two plotted and
Whispered while they waited
The worst delegated again and said
"Listen friend let's invent a way to get
Paid a greater dividend
In the end we can each
Have half this treasure
If we get our acts together
Now and take drastic measures"
The other asked incredulously
"How can this be
When right now we're bound to
Split the treasure by three?" "Let's see
" said the first with a savage laugh
"Just imagine the third man gets
Stabbed in the back now, I'm bad at maths
Addition and subtraction
But don't we get to split
The treasure in half then?
You distract him when he comes
Back with the wine
And I'll make sure our young friend
Gets stabbed in the spine
The first attack is mine, then you back me up
Just slash his gut, and add the last cut
To our friend's bad luck" And
Because of his greed
The other agreed to this covetous deed
By the trunk of this tree
They waited to pounce
While the youngest of the three
Made his way into town
Weighted down by the thought of
A whole lotta gold
Which inaudibly caught ahold of him
And gnawed at his soul
He wanted it so bad he could taste it
Any part of it shared was like
A part of it wasted
And he harboured a hatred in his heart
And decided never to let this precious
Treasure get divided
And guided by the shine of carnal greed
He went to buy the wine
And then to the pharmacy
And, sounding harmless
He asked for this black ointment
That he'd seen used in the past as rat poison
Meaning to trap his boys
Into drinking tainted wine
While at the same time thinking
"The game is mine!"
Another famous line that became
His last words 'Cause when he got back
The others acted first
And stabbed him mercilessly
With vicious blows
And since the kid was quick
To give up the ghost
They proposed a victory toast to the crime
And both enjoyed a glass of the poisoned wine
And collapsed, going blind
In a fit of convulsions
Which halted their pulses and
Ultimately resulted in
Their spirit's' expulsions
And because of their greed
They did indeed find Death under the tree

They did indeed find Death under the tree