Okay, that's fine. But "brimming with allegory and unconventional metaphor" is not necessarily an indicator of quality, no matter how much you or some others may personally subjectively prefer lyrics that fall into that category. (not to mention the fact that I'm sure many of us could point out a lot of songs out there that are similarly brimming with allegory and unconventional metephore that suck out loud)
I'm not saying that it's an indicator of quality, really. I'm saying that it's an indicator of
qualities, i.e., poetic qualities, and when it comes to those, JP's more recent lyrics have few. And, unfortunately, it's hard to have "quality" lyrics without any of those "qualities".
It's a fair comment that metaphors and allegories can suck. But I'd certainly appreciate the attempt, for what it's worth. I've always thought some of JP's lyrics were maybe too obfuscating in the early parts of his career, and I never really liked "Under a Glass Moon" much, but JP's lyrics could definitely benefit from a bit more of the courage he demonstrated earlier in his career.
Beneath the summer sky
Under glass moonlight
The night awaits the lamb's arrival
Liquid shadows crawl
Silver teardrops fall
The bride subsides to her survivalSure, it might appear to be a little pretentious, and some of it could be definitely be reworked or rephrased (it's NOT perfect), but at least it's memorable, it sticks with me and begs me to interpret. Listening to those lines sung or just reading them on a page alone makes me ponderous, and inspires me to think. This is, on average, true about most Dream Theater lyrics on Dream Theater's first 5 or 6 records, and is on average not true for DT's last 4 or 5 records, which is a real shame coming from the a band that so often emphasizes topics surrounding thought, dreams, illusion, the mind, and so on.