The Sleepwalkers (Remastered 2021) Songtext
von Van der Graaf Generator

At night, this mindless army
Ranks unbroken by dissent
Is moved into action
And their pace does not relent

In step, with great precision
These dancers of the night
Advance against the darkness
How implacable their might

Eyes un-dulled by moon
Their arms and legs akimbo
They walk and live, hoping soon
To surface from this limbo

Their minds, anticipating the dawn of the day
Shall never know what′s waiting mere insight away
Too far, too soon

Senses dimmed in semi-sentience
Only wheeling through this plane
Only seeing fragmented images
Prematurely curtailed by the brain


But breathing, living, knowing
In some measure at least
The soul which roots the matter
Of both Beauty and the Beast

From what tooth or claw does murder spring?
From what flesh and blood does passion?
Both cut through the air with the pendulum's swing
In deadly but delicate fashion

And every range of feeling is there in the dream
And every logic′s reeling in the force of the scream (ah!)
The senses sting
And though I may be dreaming and reality stalls
I only know the meaning of sight and that's all
And that's nothing

The columns of the night advance
Infectiously, their cryptic dance
Gathers converts to the fold
In time, the whole raw world
Will pace these same steps on
Into the same bitter end


Somnolent, muster now the dancing dead
Forsake the shelter of their secure beds
Awaken to a slumber whose depths they dread
As if the ground they tread would give way

Beneath the solemn weight of their conception
Oh, I′d search the hidden corners of all this world
Make reason of the sensory whorl
If I only had time
But soon, the dream is ended

Tonight, before you lay down
To the sweetness of your sleep
Do you question your surrender
To the drop from Lover′s Leap?

Or does the anaesthetic darkness
Take hold on its very own?
Does your body rise in service
With not one dissenting groan?

These waking dreams of life and death
In the mirror, are twisted and buckled
Lashes flicker, a catch of breath
Skin whitening at the knuckles

The army of sleepwalkers shake their limbs and are loose
And though I am a talker, I can phrase no excuse
Not to rise again

In the chorus of the nighttime, I belong
I, like you, must dance to that moonlight song
In the end I, too, must pay the cost of this life
If all is lost, none is known

And how could we lose what we've never owned?
Oh, I′d search out every knowledge that I could find
Unravel all the mysteries of mind
If I only had time
If I only had time
But soon, my time is ended
Ended
Ended