The Mousetrap (Caught in) [From Skeletons of Songs Bootleg] Peter Hammill

[Verse 1]
After all said and done
Not very much will have been either way:
I'm a chronicler of action
I'm an actor in the play
I know the lines I have to speak
I know that I won't ever quit, corpse, or dry
But the performance gets so pointless
And the days just drift on by

[Bridge 1]
Every time that I go to turn the pages of the calendar
In the third act of this twenty-ninth year of the show
I'm aware of the latest leading lady and get mad at her...
It's perfunctory, but why she'll never know

[Instrumental]

[Verse 2]
When I bеgan I had my hopes
That I could be a leading light of thе stage
But now I've stunned myself to silence
Extinguished all my inner rage
Exhausted all my joy and violence
Trapped all my feelings in a cage