Two Thousand Seasons

Two Thousand Seasons
Album	Yam, the King of Crops
Released	1994
Artist	the Mountain Goats
Length	1:40
Previous Track	"Alagemo"
Next Track	"Chinese Rifle Song"

Two Thousand Seasons is the sixth song on the cassette Yam, the King of Crops. It was re-released on the compilation Protein Source of the Future...Now!.

Lyrics

How have we come to be mere mirrors to annihilation
Whom do we aspire to reflect our people's death
For whose entertainment shall we sing our agony
What hopes that the destroyers aspiring to extinguish us
Will suffer conciliatory remorse at the sight of their own fantastic success
The last imbecile that dreamed such dreams is dead
Killed by the saviors of his dreams
How have we come to be mere mirrors to annihilation
How have we come to be mere mirrors to annihilation

Comments by John Darnielle About this Song

• “There’s a piece on a tape called Yam, the King of Crops that I made in 1994 where I was very into postcolonial literature and I was reading a book by Ayi Kwei Armah called The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born – no, was it that one? No, it was Two Thousand Seasons, it’s the name of the track and I got the idea to spin this toy over my head, it made a humming sound, and chant a paragraph from this book while I uh, while the noise happened. I think there’s people who’ve been waiting twenty years to find out what that sound is.” -- 2022-02-01 book reading at Town Hall Seattle

Things Referenced in this Song

• This song, like much of 'Yam, King of Crops', makes implicit reference to African literature: specifically, the book "Two Thousand Seasons" by Ghanaian novelist Ayi Kwei Armah. Similar references may be seen in "Coco-Yam Song", which alludes to "Things Fall Apart" by Nigerian (Igbo) author Chinua Achebe.