Vertical

"Vertical"
track 3 from Painting With (2016) by Animal Collective
Length: 4:14
← Previous "Hocus Pocus"	Next → "Lying in the Grass"

Mountains in Kauai
Make me feel so lowly
Cower at their power
Vertical I like

Dizzy under buildings
Bending like their willing
Is it what I’m seeing
Vertical is fright

Hard to gain perspective
Often it’s perplexing
Reaching for a record
Vertical is sight

Hanging on a pylon
Dropping from a million
Jumping hill to hill on
Vertical is height

People live above you
Postured like a totem
Runnin’ up some stairs oh
Vertical is might

Stalling on a nose and
Places to propose in
Seeing everything from
Vertical is light

Diamonds of the sky on
Black and endless background
Reaching out to grab them
Vertical at night

My imagination
Reaches to forever
Like an endless tower
Vertical I write

So high and still it sends a feeling through me
(Oh, up above me, falling over)
Suddenly not vertical

Breathe in the air the goes through a system that is
(down below me working steady)
Weary when it’s vertical
A tree we are with limbs extending to the sun
(Single holly, finches calling)
very lovely vertical

Come find me floating up if you should find me gone
(Nice and breezy, spirits easy)

Did you hear a child say?

My feet cant cross the parking lot
The parking lot is way too hot

Then everything went vertical

For me, for me

At the tips of cities
Birds are tracing columns
Windows bend in wind
Vertical in flight


Down below a statue
People stand in poses
Making good impressions
Vertical delights

Lying on a trunk
And waiting to be dreaming
Startled by a thumpin
Vertical insight

Lots of people thinkin
Thinking about falling
Nothing but a rope so
Vertical hold tight

Sometimes you feel the pressure dropping on you
(Heavy folders, daring soldiers)
Crashing from the vertical

I start to wonder does this system matter?
(Crumbling boulder, couldn’t hold her)
Only if it’s vertical

Even in leaves some creatures build themselves a home
(Ancient maples, empty stables)
Can’t always be vertical

Lifted above the din, their world's a peaceful dome
(Natures diet, finding quiet)
They don’t hear the child say

My feet won’t cross the parking lot
The parking lot is way too hot

Then everything went vertical