Nick Cave thought about the second coming of Jesus…
I’ve searched the holy books
I tried to unravel the mystery of Jesus Christ, the saviour
I’ve read the poets and the analysts
Searched through the books on human behaviour
I travelled this world around
For an answer that refused to be found
… and then he wrote a song about the return of Jesus:
Time Jesum Transeuntum Et Non Riverentum
We were called to the forest and we went down
A wind blew warm and eloquent
We were searching for the secrets of the universe
And we rounded up demons
And forced them to tell us what it all meant
We tied them to trees
And broke them down one by one
On a scrap of paper they wrote these words
And as we read them the sun broke through the trees
‘Dread the passage of Jesus for He will not return’
Then we headed back to our world and left the forest behind
Our hearts singing with all the knowledge of love
But somewhere, somehow we lost the message along the way
And when we got home we bought ourselves a house
And we bought a car that we did not use
And we bought a cage and two singing birds
And at night we’d sit
And listen to the canaries’ song
For we’d both run right out of words
Now the stars they are all angled wrong
And the sun and the moon refuse to burn
But I remember a message in a demon’s hand
Dread the passage of Jesus for He does not return
(listen to the recording by Nick Cave and The Dirty Three on YouTube)
Come 11;59 p.m. Hawaii time, we’ll see who was right: Harold Camping or Nick Cave.
I’m betting on Nick.
