Love was a promise made of smoke   In a frozen copse of trees   A bone cold and older than our bodies   Slowly floating in the sea   Every morning there were planes   The shiny blades of pagan angels in our father's skies   Every evening I would watch her hold the pillow   Tight against her hollows, her unholy child   I was still a beggar shaking out my stolen coat   Among the angry cemetery leaves   When they caught the king beneath the borrowed car   Righteous, drunk, and fumbling for the royal keys      Love was a father's flag and sung like a shank   In a cake on our leather boots   A beautiful feather floating down   To where the birds had shit on empty chapel pews   Every morning we found one more machine   To mock our ever waning patience at the well   Every evening she'd descend the mountain stealing socks   And singing something good where all the horses fell   Like a snake within the wilted garden wall   I'd hint to her every possibility   While with his gun the pagan angel rose to say   "My love is one made to break every bended knee"