Betwixt The Shelves

Описание: A warm Irish folk ballad about a woman who finds her home not in places, but in pages.

Betwixt the Shelves follows a book-loving narrator as she wanders through the classics she’s lived inside — from Scottish legends and Irish myth to Austen’s restraint, Shakespeare’s tragedy, American restlessness, Russian soul-searching, and Hugo’s defiant hope.

Sung with a strong Irish accent and carried by acoustic folk instrumentation, the song leans into storytelling over spectacle — intimate, literary, and fireside-close.

This is a love song to books, to borrowed lives, and to the quiet places we return to when the world grows loud.

Artist: Operational Cadence
Track: Betwixt the Shelves
Genre: Irish Folk
Release: 2026

Lyrics:
[Intro]
Ah now, hush ye, the fire’s alive
There’s stories yet that won’t lie quiet

[Verse 1]
Aye, I learned me love by candle glow
On lonesome nights where the rain’d go slow
Walter Scott on a chair gone weak
Where honour bends but hearts don’t break

Burns’d grin if he heard me say
Love’ll break ye clean, then bid ye stay
I marked them lines I daren’t say
Some truths don’t fade, they’ll have their way

[Verse 2]
Yeats left doors not rightly shut
Fair folk stirrin’ where they ought not
I half believed, I won’t be coy
There’s magic waits where reason’s coy

Old island tales with salt and brine
Selkies cryin’ for lives not mine
I never asked were they lies or true
I read ’em same as I always do

[Pre-Chorus]
Every spine knows me name
Even when I’m not the same

[Chorus]
I don’t need roads, I don’t need gold
I roam the world when pages fold
If you’re askin’ where I’ll bide me still
I’m betwixt the shelves, aye, always will
Betwixt the shelves, soft and smart
Every book near splits me heart

[Verse 3]
Miss Austen taught me how to wait
How pride stands tall, how love comes late
In quiet rooms with eyes cast low
Where wantin’ learns what not to show

The Brontë wind on the moor ran wild
Said love’ll wound ye, fierce and mild
I closed the book, then read once more
Some hurts are keys, some bar the door

[Verse 4]
Shakespeare near drove me mad
Kings gone thin and lovers sad
Fools spoke truth, the wise passed by
All the world’s a grand soft lie

Poor Ophelia in the stream
Still pullin’ hard at broken dreams
Every play still cuts me through
’Cause it kens what we’ll do

[Pre-Chorus]
Some hearts roar, some hearts fight
Mine reads on into the night

[Chorus]
I don’t need roads, I don’t need gold
I cross the seas when pages fold
If you’re lookin’ where I dwell
I’m betwixt the shelves, I know ’em well
Betwixt the shelves, low and kind
Every life I left behind

[Bridge]
Huck Finn ran from names and rules
Melville chased old ghostly truths
I stood with Ishmael on the rail
Knowin’ fine some hunts’ll fail

Dostoevsky stared me bare
Asked what sin a soul can bear
Grace and guilt in the same breath
Some books won’t rest ’til death

Hugo roared from broken stone
Loved the lost and called ’em home
I don’t know if hope survives
But I read it like it might

[Final Chorus]
I don’t need crowns, I don’t need fame
I’ve worn a thousand borrowed names
From Scottish hills to Paris dark
To Russian nights that leave their mark
If love’s a tale, here’s me part
Betwixt the shelves, I left me heart

[Outro]
Ah now… let the wide world rule
I’ll stay here yet. This quiet rule.

*Written as part of an ongoing exploration of genre and form.
Composed using traditional notation and modern production techniques.*