Dr. Watson, I Presume - Elvis Costello

I sat in a motel room with the doctor

Just before we were supposed to sing

He said regarding this guardian wing

This black and clipped misshapen thing

Hobbling on from claw to ring

Hung upside down and cawing

Pecking at carrion of the fallen

Battalion

Thawing

On frozen mooring

Blackbird in a crust no more

They fell down 4 and 20

Bloodstained the land of want and plenty

Now raven standing at his shoulder

Stared with eyes of molten solder

Dripping on a lacquer box

Introducing keys to locks

Seven talents there where hidden

Mysterious and some forbidden

Take the honey from the comb

Ravel thread around the loom

Dig the dirt up from the tomb

Dr. Watson, I presume

One will follow

Two unknown sorrow

Three for laughter

Four ever after

Five-foot flood when the waters hit

Six feet deep, the eternal pit

Seven prayers and seven pleas

To eight imagined deities

Cat o' nine tails

Cat of nine lives

Brides turned into old wives tales

Your complexion colours then it pales

And into the sunset it sails

Soon these secrets will be scattered

Heaven knows what lies inside

It took a moment to discover

A lifetime to decide