[Intro — solo voice, no instruments] I am the last mouth that can say the five names. Count them with me while a mouth remains to count. [Verse 1 — drone enters] Saltmarch first, on the grey wound of the water, where they hung the sea in sheds until it hardened. They traded white for everything and thought that made them needed. Salt keeps meat. Salt does not keep men. [Verse 2] Millward second, gold-throated in the low fields, who fed the other four and never let them forget it. They weighed the grain, they weighed the friendship after, and found the friendship lighter every year. [Verse 3 — first drum] Anvilgate third, that made the iron-weather, whose smoke you could taste from a day's walk out. They sold the blades to all of us in turn. They sold the blades. They kept the making. [Verse 4] Kiln fourth, who took the plain sand up and gave it back as windows, as seeing-through. The only one of us that made a beautiful thing. The first of us to go. [Verse 5 — drums double] Thornwood last, and least, and stubborn with it, who had the trees and therefore had the roofs, who asked for nothing and was given nothing, and stood the longest, and stood alone. [Chorus — full chorus, unison] Five we were. Five, and each one certain. Five, and not one of us enough. [Verse 6] Then the cold count came down out of the north — not raiders, no. Raiders you can outlast. This came with clerks. This came with a offer. This came asking only that we stop being five. [Verse 7] And we would not sit. We would not sit together. Saltmarch would not sit beneath the grain. The forge would arm us all and stand behind us. The glass-town shattered first, and we called it their mistake. [Chorus — drums at full] Five we were. Five, and each one certain. Five, and not one of us enough. [Bridge — chorus only, chanted, accelerating] Salt. Grain. Iron. Glass. Wood. Salt. Grain. Iron. Glass. Wood. One would have held. One would have held. Five could not. [Final section — solo voice, one drum] I am the last mouth that can say the five names, and I have said them, and the saying changes nothing, and I will say them again tomorrow. Not so they are remembered. So that the north must go on hearing them.
