Break the Cycle
(by Free Prometheus)
Central Ave. Bridge over I-10 and Margaret T. Hance Park
Local indie punk band performing at a small music festival beneath Central Ave. Bridge at Margaret T. Hance Park.
Central Ave. Bridge over I-10 and Margaret T. Hance Park
Local indie punk band performing at a small music festival beneath Central Ave. Bridge at Margaret T. Hance Park.
Based on voter data, it’s been said that more than 85% of people currently living in the Phoenix metro area were not born in the Valley of the Sun. Out of nearly five million people, only about 750,000 are locals, including members of indigenous communities and “native Phoenicians” of other backgrounds. Another 15%—or 750,000 people—were born outside of the U.S., including around 500,000 from Mexico who merge in colorful and elegant ways with Phoenix’ large and vibrant community of American citizens with Mexican heritage. Before Arizona’s statehood in 1912, before Phoenix became the territorial capital in 1889, before Arizona became a territory split from New Mexico in 1863 as a military maneuver by Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War—before the Southwest was even part of the U.S., the Salt River Valley was occupied by O’odham, Piipaash, and other indigenous people who lived here and throughout Arizona for several thousands of years. The history of these indigenous communities in the mountains and valleys of Arizona goes back to time immemorial, with archaeological records dating beyond 20,000 years ago, when the Ice Age still swept through what would later become Snowflake, AZ. Sacred places preserved in the Phoenix metro area contain public and private buildings from before the year 500 and petroglyphs—writing and imagery preserved in rock—from 5,000 years ago, around the same time the first recorded Pharoah began to rule in Egypt. Some of these sites historically controlled the headgates for large sections of the canal system that the local civilization developed and thrived on until around the 14th Century (1300-1400) when recurrent disaster-level flooding, changes in climate, the decline of natural food resources may have played a part in what caused most or all of the population to move away from their urban centers and develop new lifestyles over the following centuries. Despite these changes and the tragedies that followed, today’s indigenous communities maintain an unbroken line of tradition and heritage with their ancestors. There’s another connection that all modern Phoenicians and visitors share with them as well: the canals. Phoenix today is built on two things—highways and canals. Around half of today’s canal system follows routes originally dug more than a thousand years ago. Even the Grand Canal can be seen flowing right past the edge of S’edav Va’aki, a sacred site near the Sky Harbor that was a major center for daily life for a thousand years beginning around 450 AD. Many people think of Phoenix as a new city, but it’s actually one of the oldest on the continent. Each of us living here today is simply a steward and a guest on land with history stretching back beyond imagination. Twenty miles to the Northwest of Downtown there are hills 500 feet high made of lava rock where carvings made by human hands have survived for five thousand years. Back then, people lived in the canyons and valleys, following the rivers and creeks. Today we follow the curves of the I-10 and I-17, Loops 101, 202, and 303, Superstition Freeway (U.S. Route 60), and other highways—including Route 66 up North through Flagstaff. We walk in the shadow of buttes, spires, and mesas fashioned from concrete and steel. We even have that artificial canyon, carved near the northern edge of Downtown Phoenix between 1983 and 1990 to make way for the final piece of Interstate 10. Suspended in the air above this canyon is an anomaly: a bridge over a bridge. The deck over the Interstate upon which Margaret T. Hance Park sprawls is made up of a series of nineteen side-by-side overpasses. Thus, the bridge that connects Central Ave. between Portland and Culver Sts. is what could be called a “meta-bridge.” It sits at the juncture between the vibrant business and cultural districts of Downtown and Midtown (the City of Phoenix considers the boundary between these neighborhoods to be at McDowell Rd., though this point is hotly contested in some circles). Hance Park is the place that made Patriot Square Park redundant and expendable. It should be the living, beating heart of Phoenix, but it’s most often empty. The Japanese Friendship Garden and the Irish Cultural Center are active on the fringes of the park, as well as the Phoenix Center for the Arts over on 3rd St. But it’s easy to start believing that most of the time, most of the people in the park itself are those who have nowhere else to go. The park explodes with bustle for the occasional music festival and the annual St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, but a cost of these activations is that those who have been staying in the park are forced out, and the area is fenced off in the days leading up the event. In this recording, a local band plays at one of the smaller music events with the mainstage set up beneath this meta-bridge. The song includes lyrics in Latin: a translation of the English chorus, circuitum frangere debemus / et vita convalescet, ita—we must break the cycle / and life will get better, yeah—and the bridge, non est ad astra / mollis e terris via—to the stars there is no / easy path from the Earth. The latter—the musical bridge sung in between the two structural bridges over the Interstate—is a quote from Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger’s Hercules Furens (The Mad Hercules) that has often been interpreted to mean there is no easy way to reach our dreams or to accomplish important things. In Seneca’s verses, Hercules discovers that he has committed dreadful crimes in a state of mindless rage. He wants to kill himself, but is convinced to live and seek forgiveness, breaking the cycle of violence. The song uses episodes from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil’s Aenied to discuss a similar theme. The band’s name is a reference to the Greek legend of Prometheus, who steals fire from the Gods for humankind, but is cursed to be imprisoned for eternity on a rock in the middle of the sea where an eagle eats his liver over and over again.
(Some of the information in these liner notes is fictional, presented here in the attempt of satire)
(Some of the information in these liner notes is fictional, presented here in the attempt of satire)
LYRICS
“Tell me, O Muse, why is it that all the problems that we’re trying to fix today are the same problems we were trying to solve five hundred years ago, five thousand years ago? Tell me, O Muse, can we ever get out of this vicious cycle?”
Agamemnon wanted revenge
So, he sacrificed his daughter
And he sent out the Greeks
To die for him
The people of Troy
They watched and cried
As their hero, Hector, fell
And bled out on the sand
When the walls were breached
Achilles was killed by Alexander
Avenging his brother
By his own hand
And Odysseus, the hero
He sailed on home back to Ithaca
To find his wife, she was surrounded
By other men
And though Penelope stayed true
He slaughtered all twenty-two
Because he wanted revenge
The cycle never ends
What can anyone do?
You gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Break the cycle, and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Non est ad astra
Mollis e Terris via
Honey, I’m home! Agamemnon said
When he got back to Mycenae
But Clytaemnestra
She just killed him
So Elektra and her brother
They killed their mother
But as she died
She cursed Orestes with fury
And Aeneas escaped
When his homeland fell
He went to Carthage, there he met the Queen
And she said Mmm
Baby, do you love me?
But Aeneas had to go
So Dido took her own life
And as his lover died, he cried to the Gods
Will mortal man ever find peace?
They said If you’re aiming for the stars
Your path will be very hard
But if you sing this song, as you walk along
You will make it far
Circuitum frangere debemus
Circuitum frangere debemus
Et vita convalescet, ita
Et vita convalescet, ita
Non est ad astra
Mollis e Terris via
Break the cycle and life gets better
Break the cycle and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle and life gets better
Circuitum frangere debemus
Circuitum frangere debemus
Et vita convalescet, ita
Et vita convalescet, ita
Agamemnon wanted revenge
So, he sacrificed his daughter
And he sent out the Greeks
To die for him
The people of Troy
They watched and cried
As their hero, Hector, fell
And bled out on the sand
When the walls were breached
Achilles was killed by Alexander
Avenging his brother
By his own hand
And Odysseus, the hero
He sailed on home back to Ithaca
To find his wife, she was surrounded
By other men
And though Penelope stayed true
He slaughtered all twenty-two
Because he wanted revenge
The cycle never ends
What can anyone do?
You gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Break the cycle, and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle, and life gets better
Non est ad astra
Mollis e Terris via
Honey, I’m home! Agamemnon said
When he got back to Mycenae
But Clytaemnestra
She just killed him
So Elektra and her brother
They killed their mother
But as she died
She cursed Orestes with fury
And Aeneas escaped
When his homeland fell
He went to Carthage, there he met the Queen
And she said Mmm
Baby, do you love me?
But Aeneas had to go
So Dido took her own life
And as his lover died, he cried to the Gods
Will mortal man ever find peace?
They said If you’re aiming for the stars
Your path will be very hard
But if you sing this song, as you walk along
You will make it far
Circuitum frangere debemus
Circuitum frangere debemus
Et vita convalescet, ita
Et vita convalescet, ita
Non est ad astra
Mollis e Terris via
Break the cycle and life gets better
Break the cycle and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle and life gets better
Gotta break the cycle and life gets better
Circuitum frangere debemus
Circuitum frangere debemus
Et vita convalescet, ita
Et vita convalescet, ita
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