Carpe Diem Baby
Hit dirt
Shake tree
Split sky
Part sea
Strip smile
Lose cool
Bleed the day
And break the rule
Live win
Dare fail
Eat the dirt
And bite the nail
Then make me miss you
Then make me miss you
So wash your face away with dirt
It don't feel good until it hurts
So take this world and shake it
Come squeeze and suck the day
Come carpe diem, baby
Draw Lead
Piss wine
Sink teeth
All mine
Stoke fire
Break neck
Suffer through this
Cheat on death
Hug the curve
Lose the time
Tear the map
And shoot the sign
Then make me miss you
Then make me miss you
So wash your face away with dirt
It don't feel good until it hurts
So take this world and shake it
Come squeeze and suck the day
Come carpe diem, baby
Live win
Dare fail
Eat dirt
Bite the nail
Strip smile
Lose cool
Bleed the day
And break the rule
Hug the curve
Lose the time
Tear the map
And shoot the sign
Then make me miss you
Then make me miss you
So wash your face away with dirt
It don't feel good until it hurts
So take this world and shake it
Come squeeze and suck the day
Come make me miss you
Come carpe diem baby
Come carpe diem baby
Commentary
(Metallica)
It has become unfashionable to like Metallica these days, but nonetheless, of all the hard-rock and heavy-metal groups that I have heard, I think Metallica would rank very high indeed for the power and beauty of their lyrics. Indeed, they are one of the few bands that I started listening to because I was very powerfully moved by the poetry of songs like ‘Sad But True’, ‘Holier Than Thou’, ‘Fade To Black’, ‘Sanatarium’ etc. ‘Carpe Diem Baby’ is one of my favourites – short lines, chosen and brought together with a mastery that gives the whole song tremendous coherence and meaning.
In suggesting that you run this song on Minstrels, my judgment is clouded by the fact that, having listened to the song before having read the lyrics, I cannot imagine what the words sound like when read as poetry – despite my best attempts at self-control, whenever I read it out loud, I lapse into the languid drawled-out melody of the song. However, reading it, one cannot under any circumstances mistake it for the scribblings of an illiterate or unskilled man. Metallica, for all the trappings of the genre that they chose, still project an image of culture, and for that reason, I do think their work deserves a place among the greats.
- Ajitq
Martin adds
Interestingly, until I got to the “then make me miss you…” bit, I didn’t realise it was a song at all. I was even more surprised to hear that the music was languid and drawled-out; read in isolation the lyrics project a sort of intense, driven energy, and a rhythm reminiscent of Hood’s “No!” [Poem #251] with its short, choppy and tightly rhymed lines. I ought to hunt up the song sometime.
— Martin
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From the Wondering Minstrels mailing list, 1999–2008.
Alkemygirl · 3 September 2003
Love the rhythm here!
More and more I look forward to Minstrels daily…. Thanks to Sitaram, Martin and Abraham!
Martin DeMello · 6 September 2003
As long as you steer clear of the music :)
martin (just kidding - don’t lynch me!)
Reed C. Bowman · 6 September 2003
I didn’t suspect it was a song until the complete repeats began. Like Martin, I read the compressed two-word lines as short, explosive little punches of language. In this it reminded me of the Gwendolyn Brooks poem “We real cool,” but I was if anything more impressed by the variety and power they got in all those lines of two words. Maybe there is something to this Metallica stuff, after all…
Carolyn McGrath · 8 September 2003
Hello all
After Martin’s “I ought to hunt out this song sometime”, I felt compelled to hear it and find out how the apparent contradiction between the length of line and the “languid, drawled out melody” resolved itself. So, I got a friend to work his magic on the internet to find and play it for me, and was rewarded with the insistent, pounding drive of the music and the smooth, melodic tones of the vocals. Very powerful and strangely hypnotic and poignant. Good fun. Any chance of running more lyrics and can Sitaram add the sound or put in a link?
Carolyn McGrath
Tony Landa · 10 February 2004
this is a true poem about ceasing the day i listen to this song everyday it is available on the re-load album, it is a song by Metallica.