Just behind the station, before you reach the traffic island
A river runs through a concrete channel
I took you there once; I think it was after the Leadmill
The water was dirty and it smelt of industrialisation
Little mesters coughing their lungs up
And globules the colour of tomato ketchup

But it flows, yeah, it flows

Underneath the city through dirty brickwork conduits
Connecting white witches on the Moor
With pre-raphaelites down in Broomhall
Beneath the old Trebor factory
That burnt down in the early seventies
Leaving an antiquated sweet-shop smell
And caverns of nougat and caramel

Nougat
Yeah, nougat and caramel

And the river flows on
Yeah, the river flows on
Beneath pudgy fifteen-year olds addicted to coffee whitener
Courting couples naked on Northern Upholstery
And pensioners gathering dust like bowls of plastic tulips
And it finally comes above ground again at Forge Dam
The place where we first met
I went there again for old time's sake
Hoping to find the child's toy-horse ride
That played such a ridiculously tragic tune
It was still there, but none of the kids seemed interested in riding on it
And the cafe was still there too
The same press-in plastic letters on the price list
And scuffed formica-top tables
I sat as close as possible to the seat where I'd met you that autumn afternoon
And then, after what seemed like hours of thinking about it
I finally took your face in my hands and I kissed you for the first time
And a feeling like electricity flowed through my whole body
And all the time, in the background
The sound of that ridiculously heartbreaking child's ride outside

At the other end of town, the river flows underneath an old railway viaduct
I went there with you once, except you were somebody else
And we gazed down at the sludgy brown surface of the water together
Then a passer-by told us that it used to be a local custom
To jump off the viaduct into the river
When coming home from the pub on a Saturday night
But that this custom had died out when someone jumped
And landed too near to the riverbank
And had sunk in the mud there
And drowned before anyone could reach them
I don't know if he'd just made the whole story up
But there's no way you'd get me to jump off that bridge
No chance, never in a million years
Yeah, a river flows underneath this city
I'd like to go there with you now, my pretty
And follow it on for miles and miles
Below other people's ordinary lives
Occasionally catching a glimpse of the moon
Through man-hole covers along the route
Yeah, it's dark sometimes
But if you hold my hand, I think I know the way
Oh, this is as far as we got last time
But if we go just another mile, we will surface
Surrounded by grass and trees
And the fly-over that takes the cars to cities
Buds that explode at the slightest touch
Nettles that sting, but not too much
I've never been past this point
What lies ahead, I really could not say
And I used to live just by the river
In a dis-used factory just off the Wicker
And the river flowed by day after day
And "One day," I thought, "One day I will follow it"
But that day never came
I moved away and lost track
But tonight I am thinking about making my way back
I may find you there and float on
Wherever the river may take me
Wherever the river may take me
Wherever the river may take us
Wherever it wants us to go
Wherever it wants us to go