Cup-Shotten

Lyrics

[Intro]
Gather round, class. Open your texts to the year 1330.
Let us examine the architecture of a stagger.

[Verse 1]
In the muddy grip of Middle English cold,
Before the printing press, before the modern text,
A peasant found his equilibrium was sold,
And let the heavy wooden vessel take his neck.
It is a linguistic marvel, you see,
Not a failing of the moral spine,
But a simple matter of archery,
When the arrow is made of barley and rye.

[Chorus]
She is cup-shotten.
Oh, wonderfully cup-shotten.
Struck down by the goblet, emptied by the ale,
A fourteenth-century triumph in a modern frame.
Look how she tilts at the edge of the bar,
She isn't just ruined, she's a falling star.
Cup-shotten.
Gloriously shot by the cup.

[Verse 2]
Observe the heavy-lidded grace of her decline.
The lexicon of 1330 lives right here!
She hasn't had a drop of modern gin or wine,
She is drinking with the ghosts of medieval peers.
To be shotten is to be completely drained,
Like a musket or a herring in the sea,
Her spirit is magnificently untamed,
Even as she leans into gravity.

[Chorus]
For she is cup-shotten.
Yes, beautifully cup-shotten.
Struck down by the goblet, emptied by the ale,
A fourteenth-century triumph in a modern frame.
Look how she tilts at the edge of the bar,
She isn't just ruined, she's a falling star.
Cup-shotten.
Gloriously shot by the cup.

[Bridge]
The vessel is the hunter, the drinker is the prey.
A six-hundred-year-old arrow finds its mark today.
It is a noble wounding, we must respect the blow.
Just catch her shoulders gently before she hits the floor below.

[Outro]
Class dismissed.
She is a living artifact.
Cup-shotten.
They knew exactly how the room would spin.
Let her rest.