Clever, So Clever

My comrade was clever, so clever.

He thought he could win the world over.

He thought he could live on forever and ever

If only he could but discover

The secrets that she would deliver

Were he to strip her of her cover,

And earn all her bounty and turn from her never

And live beside her as a brother

And live beside her as a brother

My comrade was clever, so clever.

He thought he could win the world over.

He thought he could make her his darling, his lover

By playing the part of a rover.

His coat with the luster of silver,

His eyes like the egg of a plover

He thought he would ride her mysterious river

And float on forever above her

And float on forever above her.

My comrade was clever, so clever.

He thought he could turn the world over.

He thought he would make her the slave to his slaver

And be her primordial mover.

He'd soon taste her innermost flavor

If he did the work of a delver,

And ploughed her and scoured her and churned her and drove her

And opened her up like a lever

And opened her up like a lever.

He thought he was destined to have her,

The taker, the grasper, the striver.

He thought it his due that with all this together,

He always would be a survivor.

But then came the fox from the heather

It mingled his blood with its slaver

His life from his body its teeth did dissever

And made of my friend a cadaver

And made of my friend a cadaver.

My comrade was clever, so clever.

He thought he could win the world over.

He thought it was safe to let it be his savior,

And free from all worries to hover.

But then came this final endeavor,

And all for the sake of some clover.

My comrade was clever, so frightfully clever,

And now I have buried him over

And now I have buried him over.