June Tabor - Aqaba lyrics

Aqaba

Aqaba (Bill Caddick)

A man, lost in time and space
Adrift in his dreaming
While like an Arab steed
The motorcycle flying on
Past the English fields
The misty morning hedgerow
The wind in the wire weeds
The warm sirocco sighing

Ch: Aqaba, all my life turns on you
All my life returns to you

Out of the silent wastes, no friends
No quarter the blood is up, the senses race
The last dawn is breaking
And over the sleeping host
The unsuspecting shadows
Grim as a desert ghost to
The pale ride awaiting

Now your eyes are turned from me
I shall surprise you
Turn your faces to the sea
I shall come riding
Down from the desert sands
That glorious morning
Oh, what a deadly dance drummed out of hiding

The puppies bobbing on the tide
The blood in the sand dunes
The sun dying in the sky
The black shades falling
Over the dead of night
The church bells tolling
The owl in his silent flight
The desert wind calling