"The Ice Hotel" lyrics - PETER HAMMILL

Mercury's down to zero, absolute time will tell we're only over-wintering as guests in the Ice Hotel. All that we build will crumble, every empire fades; humbled, we should admit impermanence marks the man-made. Under the Ice Hotel the permafrost is stacked but down along the walls the first melt starts to track. The wind's whipped voices up and swept them down the years but in the Ice Hotel the guests all have cloth ears. Are we all so cloth-eared?
We're only here a season, paupers and presidents. Reason allows us only a temporary residence. Inside the Ice Hotel the mirror ball revolves while in the cinema the screen goes to dissolve. Over and over what's destroyed will be remade and in the Ice Hotel we're only passing trade. The walls are sweating as the Celsius starts to climb. Of all our works this is the transient paradigm. Each year another team will build it up anew, for in the Ice Hotel we're all just passing through, we're just passing through.