| Based on a poem by Paul Verlaine. The hobby-horse is the wooden horse of the merry-go-round. Those "chevaux de bois" to which Verlaine dedicates one of his most sinister poems, makes the roundabout a symbol of the obsessiveness with which men nail themselves to the cross of their own destinies, inspiring me to write a song that could have been a lullaby, hence predominantly in 6/8 which is marred by a representation of something hypnotic and demonic, especially picking up onto the waltz, a dance that traditionally goes round and round, which you often hear on carousels. . |