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  1. 08. Nympholept

From the recording Bowlahoola

Nympholept
'... and this divine homesickness led him, pale nympholept, beyond Earth's human shores' Sylvie: Souvenirs du Valois - Gerard de Nerval
A quiveringly precious anthem to the Nympholept and his predicament. One that is lost to his unattainable obsession. Come on, we've all been there..

So you're hunting in the ancient classical forest and you come across a nymph - she is unutterably beautiful and seductive and bestows upon you her favour - perhaps it's a full blown all-the-way 'favour' or maybe just a kiss or even - I dunno - a vibe. Doesn't matter - it will never happen again however much you very much want it to and now you're sunk. You're no use to any other lover, you can't sleep or eat or concentrate on anything and maybe you get addicted to something that temporarily kills the yearning or maybe you just wither away. Palely, obviously. Such is the fate of the Nympholept in Classical times and it sounds pretty shit, right? In a very self-dramatising romantic way.
This was meant to be a kind of melancholy Eurodisco pre-raphaelite painting with a swan in it. I was struck by the Huxley title: 'after many a summer dies the swan' and the fabulously melodramatic word order of the Netflix film title: 'When Calls the Heart'.
All this stuff is pretty camp and sentimental really isn't it? I like it, though, against my more rigorous nature. 'Justine! Bring me more wilting lilies and some laudanum'
Maybe that's why some of the Goths like us...

Lyrics


NYMPHOLEPT
After the summer dies the swan
It's something everyone insists upon
Though she was faithful to the end:
still too exhausted for a final song

We know the trick God never learned:
could be he suffers with the rest of us
who have the faces we have earned
God has his bad days like the best of us

all of the life within
all of our slight designs
will come to this
morbidity
as you will see...

you will not find here what you seek -
bewildered by the thing you cannot know
Pale nympholept, you must accept
you made it so

these unremarkable delights
the fickle wind that moves the clouds around
all leave me witless in the sun
too much for you or really anyone

here on the razor's edge
here as the crowds arrive
the benefit
of all of it
you can decide

You will not find here what you seek
and lost amid the consequence of time
pale nympholept,
you must expect
this cruel decline

they are not long those vivid days
those days of rage and laughter
the soul is not consoled:
the pain remains
...and what comes after this?

they are not long those fleeting hours
those hours of consolation
the heart resigned
still misaligned
and everything will end like this

after the summer dies the swan
maybe the very last phenonemon
that serves to simulate the world
a spectacle you can rely upon

all of the life within
all of our slight designs
will come to this
morbidity
as you will see...

you will not find here what you seek -
bewildered by the thing you cannot know
Pale nympholept, you must accept
you made it so