Book excerpt: 'This mix of genuine humility and hard-won hubris, of mysticism and technical mastery ... makes Van Morrison quite simply, and quite indisputably, "The Bard of Belfast".' Paul Muldoon If I ventured in the slipstream Between the viaducts of your dreams Keep 'Er Lit is the second volume of Van Morrison's collected lyrics containing one hundred and twenty songs from across his storied career. It contains love songs, work songs, songs about the pains and anxieties of existence, songs of consolation, songs about various kinds of spiritual quest and the realms of the mystical, and songs which deal with healing and reconciliation, both with the self and with others. Then there are the songs of memory and of childhood; songs about the natural world and about the perspectives it can provide on time. Taken together with Lit Up Inside , this volume gives an overview of his fifty-year career, revealing why he is celebrated as one of the most innovative and enduring songwriters of our time.