written with Gunnar Snær Gunnarsson

Born in a maze, left to the weather
Fighting the waves on my own
I cover my face with a mask of leather
A cover that waits to be blown

I found a place amongst the litter
A hole in the wall I call home
But a spiral of doubt whirls me bitter
Got to break down these walls of white stone

Outside this structure
One life to gain
Without a map
Without a chain

Winter is late yet still I shiver
It bites through the flesh to the bone
From the foundry of fate, a glowing river
Burns like the great fires of Rome

Cinder and ash start me dreaming
A handful of seed to be sown
A downpour – and then the blackness greening
Berry and root to be grown

The Blackness Greening

The Road to Calvary

The road to Calvary
Is full of holes
But no one to fill them anymore
Whole cornering curves crumbling into chasm
You’d almost think the road commissioner was dead these twenty years
Not a journey you should be taking after dark

The road to Calvary
Was socked in before the dawn
And you how fog makes
Each tree stand alone
Sort of blots out the background

O pilgrim
O witch

The road to Calvary
Is full of signs
Absolutely riddled!
But there’s no one to read them anymore
No one to say they can’t be read
Because of rust, forgotten referents, bullet holes
The tooth of time

 


The road to Calvary
Is littered with shrines
But no one to tend them anymore
No one to replace stone upon stone upon stone
No one to take wildflowers from the creekbed and place them on stone upon stone upon stone
No one to say her name
So what’s a shrine for anyhow?

O pilgrim 
O witch

The road to Calvary
Is a monument, a testament, a testimony
To your biggest goof
The failure that forever stains your name
The road to Calvary raises a few questions
Why, why, why
Like arrows soaked in flaming oil
Why are you a tourist here again?
Wasn’t the first time medicine enough?
Why climb up onto that crosstree again?
Why pound nail after nail into your beautiful hands?

The Road to Calvary

This Beast
Outside Poughkeepsie (A Thousand Roadsides)
The Fight
Ring in the Day
New Old Ladder
Waiting

Featuring Misha Hoekstra (guitar & vocals) and Karen Vibeke (violin and additional vocals)

All songs written by Misha Hoekstra, together with Kasper Lapp on Outside Poughkeepsie, Karen Vibeke on The Fight, and David Wilkinson on Waiting

Sound/video: Janek Romaniszyn, Steffen Galster
Mastering: Søren Lyhne

Bear & Butterfly at the Copenhagen Listening Room, 3 March 2024 (Minka Hoist & Karen Vibeke)

Outside Poughkeepsie (A Thousand Roadsides)

Yellow tree-leaves laugh like water 
Tall grasses bow in waves 
You’re the son of a preacher’s daughter 
The preacher's rolling in his grave 

You say he never saw the ocean 
Or sent letters on a screen 
Autumn breezes cause commotion 
This is the worst you’ve ever seen 

[chorus] 
Turn, turn the soil 
Black-red mud 
Drips like oil 
Tastes like blood 

His days peeling off like paper 
Nights spent feeling phantom pain 
But all your promises turned vapor 
All your pleasures, they are vain 

[chorus] 

He tried so hard to prepare you 
For a life you’ll never lead 
Short-term jobs and lovers snare you 
You raise no stone, you plant no seed 

[chorus] 
[chorus]

Turn, Turn the Soil

Turn, Turn The Soil

Text & perfomance: Gunnar Gunnarsson, Misha Hoekstra
Music: Lars Ingesman, Bo Bergholt Grymer

Lake of feathers / lake of air / lake that takes you / anywhere
Raft to float on / raft adrift / raft where laughter / is a gift

[chorus]
Head in the valley / feet on the ground / worlds turning around
You’re back in the game / feeling no shame / for this life you have found

Field of sunshine / field of grass / all the buried / things of brass
Green patina / beneath the dirt / you clean with acid / a little squirt

[chorus]

Brass bananas / brass sneaky snake / brass you cast back / in the lake
Lake of feathers / lake of air / lake that takes you / anywhere / lake so fair / lake to share / with me

Brass Bananas

This Beast

Du slår bak, slår i bordet, sætter tegn
Tegner livet lystigt og lyst
Som blomsterduft efter forårsregn
Lad din stemme hviske mig rund

Ligger blødt i dine blå og bløde blikke
Bæres ud på det åbne hav
Det klæ'r dig godt at være frihedskæmper
Lad dine arme slå frejdigt ud

	Ud under himlen, ud i livet, vi lever jo lige nu! 
	Du ser mine drømme, du vækker mine håb
	Du ser mine drømme og vækker mig så blidt
	Jeg danser ud af natten, ånder endelig frit

Tørrer af, tørrer mine øjne, kigger ind
Pudser linsen til min sjæl
Af dit lys blusser flammen til dans
Tag min hånd og dans nu frejdigt ud

(skrevet af David Kildekær og Misha Hoekstra

Satellit

It was strange when you were born
Now you’re stranger yet
Accidents always fall to you
You’re dancing with no net

Three raisins, once plump with juice
Baked into a yellow loaf
All of us hungry, angry too
(But) no strangers to a joke

Cast tin, the Roman word for barn
And I was Stinky Clown
I hypnotized every beast in sight
Flew twelve feet ’bove the ground

Overgrown grass, a substantial stone
Saplings everywhere
Promise you’ll leave petals, and not thorns
When I’m floating through the air

It was strange when you were born
Now you’re stranger yet
Accidents always fall to you
We’re all dancing with no net

Three Raisins

(words & music: Misha Hoekstra & Svend Seegert)

It’s hunger that wakes him, he crawls from the cave
Out into splintering light
To salmon in streams, the sweet berries of dreams
His appetite makes all things bright

(chorus)
Away the earth tips, it pauses and slips
And tips back this way again
Through light and through dark, long minutes of arc
We chase the year in its spin

A buzz in the air, gold dust on each hair
Of six legs in tremulous flight
From stamen to stigma she bears the enigma
To pooled amber that’s shot through with light

A flag the winds twiddle, its ribs going brittle
It twists in the guise of a kite
From green, yellow, orange to crimson and brown
It twists till it falls into flight

Minka Hoist

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