The Belly and the Beast - Anaïs Mitchell

I in my longing lie out in the night

Unveiled and irreverently dressed

I’m lip-stuck and liquored up Picking a fight

I’m the wicked wicked witch of the west

Over the alley ways, backward and blind

And the sad and insatiable sprawl

Over the market place darkly defined

His desert is sounding a call

He was a businessman twenty five years

When the angel appeared with his orders

I am making you mine, my divine volunteer

And I’m flying you over the border

And he can’t recall where it all fell apart

Was it north of Medina or south

Where the prophecy ends and the politics start

Where the weapon went into his mouth

And everyone’s sleeping

And he’s flying

Out

And no one can keep him

Down

Now

The morning delivers the news to my door

Of my president’s war in the east

And he doesn’t tell me and I don’t know

Who’s in the belly and who is the beast

When there’s no place to run to When there’s no place to hide

It won’t matter whose side you are on Like a bomb in the basement

We couldn’t stop if we tried

And it won’t be long

It won’t be long

It won’t be long