Lyrics to
Harlequin

This version of Harlequin was released by Genesis in 1971.

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Came the night a mist dissolved the trees
And in the broken light colours fly, fading by.
Pale and cold as figures fill the glade
Grey is the web they spin, on and on, and on and on.
Through the flame still summer lingers on
Though her pictures soon shatter.

All, always the same.
But there appears in the shades of dawning,
Though your eyes are dim,
All of the pieces in the sky.

There was once a harvest in this land.
Reap from the turquoise sky, harlequin, harlequin,
Dancing round, three children fill the glade,
Theirs was the laughter in the winding stream, and in between.
Close your door, the picture fades again
From the flames in the firelight.

All, always the same,
But there appears in the shades of dawning,
Though your eyes are dim,
All of the pieces in the sky.

All, all is not lost,
And light appears in the shades of dawning
When your eyes can see
Order the pieces, put them back, put them back.

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Want more lyrics and songs by Genesis?

Genesis has released many songs over the years besides Harlequin. Genesis released songs from 1969 to 2000 spanning across albums like From Genesis To Revelation, Trespass, Nursery Cryme, Foxtrot, Selling England By The Pound, The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, A Trick Of The Tail, Wind And Wuthering, ...And Then There Were Three..., Duke, Abacab, Genesis, Invisible Touch, We Can't Dance, Calling All Stations, Genesis Archive 1967-1975, and Genesis Archives #2 1976-92. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Genesis.

If you're a fan of the music of the 1970s looking for more songs from 1971 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Harlequin by Genesis

When you decide to study the lyrics to Harlequin, you're looking at the words, verses and background chorus from the 1971 song by Genesis. Some of the lyrics to Harlequin have clear meanings and some contain metaphorical references. Like most songs, only Genesis and their collaborators know the full story behind any of the their songs.

You can understand the lyrics to Harlequin if you take apart the structure of the words. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to Harlequin" means the words set to the music of Harlequin, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Genesis. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to Harlequin and the lyrics to Harlequin are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Genesis who came here looking just for the lyrics to Harlequin, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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