Lyrics Happy the Golden Prince - Robyn Hitchcock

Happy the Golden Prince

Twenty-five hours of love in the life of «Happy the Golden Prince Rides Again,»
his sluggish purple crest flopping over his dotty eyes as he casts a revolting
shadow over the courtyard
For many years he had played by himself in the vaults and turrets of his
father’s castle, occasionally drawing back the musty curtains of burgundy red
that masked him from the challenging sun or the ovulating moon.
He would lurch
past the flies on the windowsill like a figurehead through a bag of dust,
tip over the battlements and cough himself rigid, until white tears tumbled
sluggishly from the slot in his neck.
He would watch them recede into the fiery
blue waters of the living moat and hiss with amusement as, each drop animated
into a steel grey tadpole that writhed and dipped away towards the bank
One lurid afternoon Happy was surprised to see an ex-tadpole of his develop
into something he had never before seen, for living alone as he did,
with only mirrors for company, he knew nothing of women
The creature stood motionless on the opposite bank, her alabaster limbs
beckoning him from his father’s hall.
It was weird--She seemed as still and
cold as a statue;
indeed, Happy fancied he saw ivy curling 'round her feet.
Yet, her very stillness challenged the foetid breeze that stirred the trees
and shrubs about the moat
Happy sensed that she was important
Then, suddenly she opened both her eyes for what must have been the first time,
and he saw that they were trained on him
They were of a powerful matte strawberry hue, and they shone with the luster of
newly-opened chestnuts.
Her left hand dipped slightly and her mouth turned up
at the corner, as if to finally dispel any doubts as to her existence
A creeper that dangled flaccidly from the nearest turret-top brushed against
the shoulders of the purple-headed prince as he stood, pinned, like a butterfly
on a dartboard;
transfixed, but still writhing at her beauty.
Her sneer
increased to a smile and, as it did, Happy felt like a bottle of ginger beer
that someone had shaken violently and was about to open
Giddily, he swung himself onto the battlements, grabbed the idle creeper,
and swung across the water toward the princess.
He landed with a milky squelch
at her side and beneath an extraordinarily gnarled sumac tree.
Instantly she
leapt away, giving the lie to her immobility--this was flesh and blood!
Happy was convulsed with a strange yet familiar sensation;
he felt he should
be in a bathroom
And as he looked, the lowering vegetation above and before him took on the
dingy suggestive aura of dripping taps.
The moss beneath his shiny pink feet
was breathing sponge, caressing every pore of his skin with slimy microscopic
tendrils, and the moat behind him glistened like a sapphire basin,
silhouetting the darker lilypads that floated across it like filthy suds
Abruptly, Happy broke off this reverie, and wildly rotated his gaze
The creature had vanished.
Where could it be?
Happy reared up like a stallion
and rammed through the undergrowth in pursuit of the first female he had ever
seen.
A slithering rubbery whale diverted him from his soggy course and he
glanced to his left:
There it was!
Crouched in the corner of a clearing, her eyes bleeding light
into his, wearing a leopard-skin leotard, clutching an antenna to her brow,
and muttering «mm-gah» through a megaphone at him.
The ground shook,
and the jaws of the Earth admitted Happy the golden prince headfirst into a
deep hole.
The wavy green turf closed over him, though his thrashing feet
disturbed the surface for a moment or two longer
Happy found himself upside-down in a narrow fluorescent well that was both
moist and cheesy.
He quivered uncontrollably, aching with every inch of his
soul to scratch something, but where, he could not tell.
His feet were ringing
like telephone bells, and his head felt ready to burst.
His cloak flapped open
over his head like a bat’s, and he became aware that the well was growing
hotter and more muscular.
It seemed strangely enough to be shrinking about him,
like a skin around a fine pork sausage.
Yet he didn’t mind--his whole life at
the castle lay behind him now, sterile and eventless
He thought only how he would love to sneeze, and felt nothing but relief when
the cool arms of the woman vigorously unscrewed his head, and the toothpaste
flowed out as if it were gushing from a broken dam, into the very womb of the
earth
«So that’s who I am!»
he cried
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince
Happy the golden prince