Wilderun - Ash Memory (Parts I,II,III,IV)

Wilderun - Ash Memory
Sleep at the Edge of the Earth 2015

1. And So Opens the Earth (Ash Memory Part I)
2. Hope and Shadow (Ash Memory Part II)
3. Bite the Wound (Ash Memory Part III)
4. The Faintest Echo (Ash Memory Part IV)

Lyrics:
Part I
After years of hiding in the dark
A sound is heard and the shadow is pulled apart
Just a whisper, just a fading song
A prey to capture before its voice is gone

I've scorched this land with the blood of my past
So nothing left breathing is ever able to last
I will drop all the riches I hold
To seek the candle that lights in the winter's cold

From the woods you crawled a life ago
Here you swore you'd stay
The mountain pass is marked with the very same stone
But the leaves have fallen, the trail is overgrown
I will forge ahead with the strength that I steal
From a false remembrance, from a time that wasn't real

Look back home before you go
It will soon be lost

And only when the last memory has burned
Will I believe a lesson has been learned
In the ashes I'll trace a map to guide me far
Not knowing that life still flows
Its soul becomes a scar

And if we stand
Choice laughs in our face
So we will go
And trust that something's changed

So the last wound mends
So the earth opens

Part II
As I venture where the sound has led
I rest my bones on the frosty earthen bed
It numbs my eyes so I won't have to know
I've not the strength to survive where you go

But a shell still floats upon the wind
When you breath my name
Please look beyond me
As you hang underneath

Part III
For one moment I lower to the dusty earth
And find the graves were dug while I looked to the sky
But I will fill them back up with the wine I fed your soul
I'd rather see you dead than watch you unfold

Clench the wound to seal it shut
Just bite the wound, it'll be enough

But the one road that leads out of the woods
Is watched by many birds
They'll never let me hide
From the shame of the truth
That water tastes like the stale air
And the grass is a bed of nails
So I'll drink the dirt and forget
My journey's doomed to fail
It's always doomed to fail
I'm forever doomed to fail

Clench the wound to seal it shut
Just bite the wound, it'll be enough

A dying beast crawls beside my feet
Begging for the end, for one last final sleep
But I can only stare and watch it suffer

Truth lies in the sharp edge of my blade
But if I strike, the image of the savior fades
And your memory of me becomes a name

I will accept your pain
As long as I cannot claim it for my own

I'm much too weak to suck the poison from your blood
I'll let it spill into the cup we both drink from

So I follow hope and shadow
Deeper and deeper into the forest
Letting any doubt be cleansed by darkness

Part IV
Before we go on, take a breath of air
The stench of death is something we'll have to bear
In a time of despair we take what we can
The faintest echo, a craven's quivering hand
The faintest echo, a coward's only friend
A hopeless journey I'll follow until the end