Right Before Broken

i got enough hats to cap a small country
enough soul to raise marvin gaye and make him say
hayyyyyy, so much heart, screw it being torn apart
it's in one piece now, not even sure how
i quit asking questions, the answers got depressing
i got my eyes wide shut, nicole kidman
doing a damn thing, i'm just a kid, man!


about to hit the streets and grab some coffee,
call me if you wanna take a walk with me
i'll show you how to get high, and get by
a ten minute walk, you won't wanna keep score
i'll school you in seconds, life and love retention 
missteps and miscues, i'll put you right in someone else's shoes


i have some choices to make, but hey, i have time
can't expect to rise up over night, it's a fight
i have some people to forgive and lessons to live
some prayers to say, and changes to make
taking strides, with or with out you on my side
and if you're not with me, forgive me, we can't be pals
i'm on a high cal diet, i only feed with the fattest
only listen to the wisest, answer to a goddess
oh she's beside us, i'm beside myself, i need help
humpty dumpty something - put me back together
mend it, make it new, i have something to show you
underneath this hard exterior, i'm running scared
come find me, yell my name, i'll hear you
if i haven't gone insane, and changed my name
along with my story, it all got boring
reminiscing the same memories, insisting it's love
when hell i couldn't tell, i knew nothing well
well, that's not exactly true, i know how far and long i fell
i'm fucking up my shit all. over. you.

Blank For The Stranger

i know what you're doing as you try to do it
i just wish you'd quit it
and here's for my critics
and the sloppy rain we watched together
broken hearts are clumped together
stay near me, i'm hopeful- i know it doesn't show
but things i've done don't decide what i'll do
cause moving on is such a drastic song
i play a couple notes, then get buried along

i know what you're trying to do as you do it
but quit looking sexy, it's ruining everything
mostly my plans get foiled as soon as i see you Bare
it's all too much for my fragile nerves
along with my everlasting desire to-
transform what we had into a great deal more
complex task that i dont mind
because you're still the closest stranger

i know what you do when you do it
hearts can't ache when they've been taken out
and used as weapons, i'm sorry i cried
it worsened the arid conditions that existed
when we fell in love

One Hail Mary, Then Let's Go Out

before, we would sit on the train together and pretend to be in love - just for the tourists. your arm around me. my hand on your thigh. i'd tell a story to the tourist and you'd stare passionately at me. you'd tell a story to the tourist and i'd stare admiringly at you, a quick look back to the tourist, just checking in, right back to your lips. then you would say your goodbyes and depart at your stop. me and the tourist left to rear the conversation.

as the train leaves your stop the tourist addresses me. filled with envy and anguish as he gropes through two questions. could two people be more in love? can i ever find that?
the tourist slowly comes back from that place we always sent them. the bright pasture filled with life. you bounce and the bumblebees don't scare you. and the river will never stop running, and the trees will always be in bloom.
the tourist was so far off after bearing witness to a pure love that flourishes between us.

the tourist looks back at me and makes a statement of fact: "you and your boyfriend really love each other"
i correct him on our circumstances. i tell him of our wild love for one another, but remind him that we're still young. i assure the tourist i'm in love with you, and i'm almost sure you feel exactly the same way. i tell how our unfortunate dilemma roots from the sole truth to our love. we both know that once we get together there would be nobody else after. i explained gingerly to the tourist that neither of us are ready for that sort of commitment quite yet.

at the moment we preferred to stage our love on the train. we needed to remind people of that young unconditional love. a real life memo reminding folks that this rare and untamable beast may be endangered, but it's not extinct. only hard to sustain. and while it might put on a show, it rarely makes a curtain call, and never delivers an encore.

Oh December You're Feverish

when smoke is sprawling through a dark sky

and you can't see through it with the naked eye,

love fumbles over it's own two feet

as white lies keep it trekking on

and the sky looks like the ocean

and the moon's a jellyfish that's glowing

love surrenders, but why won't we let it?

the deepest rivers, while against the current

lasso all the tiny moments, put them in a row

shoot them one by one, then

bask in the afterglow

Tribulation (The Trouble) < Trials (The Attempt)

here with you, but off to the side, after days the pain subsides
i watch you with the fury of all the bitter days

but handling it can only surely save me

from the candid pain

walking through the doors, i walk a step behind

living in the last season, there's still so much to find

i'm in a bout of rain, that i bring to the engagements
that only seems to stop when snow hits the pavement

my suicidal thoughts, while branching off from lavish lessons

erupt with flimsy reason, slams me to the prior season
while in this backward motion, i continue on
i never get to rid of you, my face red as i recite
this awful situation back to the pages in my diary
it's like reading a future where repetition's not easy
one day after then next, all filled with fear
jumping off the pages are solemn scenes,
with all the same faces
i erase and rip them up to save me from imitation

but

i want to ask you simple questions

given with a steady voice

without all of the flowery emotion

you've heard so much before

Love Is Blind And So Am I

they say love is blind, there's no doubt in my mind she is. she probably got into a bar fight and got her eyes ripped out and then they were subsequently donated to denial and falsehood. they each have but one eye to see a smaller venue, the ones that are nonsensical and lead to hatred among the people who hate themselves. these eyes, or tools, are used for pure evil, the kind that consume and devour simply standard people who know their wants but bank on the bad because it's what they've seen and what they've felt. on the inside, throughout time.

if I could lead the blind i'd tell her to take a step away from the love, from the admiration, and climb the ladder carefully feeling each rung that brings you that love. take a look at how you got there. believe you have the touch to turn that loaf of bread into the shiniest gold. the type people would take a second look at and desire immediately.

but actions will always speak louder than words, and its a real shame because at times our control diminishes from us and we're left to ruin that gold. the gold may move on, but it doesn't forget. it remembers behaviors that were set free and that turned a moment into a memory. a chilling thing that can't be revoked or reversed. and the action was disconnected from the words and thoughts, the beliefs. it took on a life of it's own, but that's what gets remembered when life returns to equilibrium. where the words are absent, when the cat has our tongue.

I Want To Stand Up And Shout About Everthing That Hurts

i hear your conversation. my ex this and my ex that. the lawyer bills, the house he bought without even telling you. the final straws. i'm not really sure what it all means, but it was depressing as heck hearing it. especially when all i can think is how lucky you were to at least have someone for whatever amount of time to be there. to be yours. to be on the same team.

so what if it faded.

i'm not sure where i stand. so happy to be here, but feeling so dismal. everyday aches by. i'm surrounded by torment. all derived from you, and not that you're at fault, but i think i'd do better without seeing you. you know i'm really nothing. i bet you breathe it everyday, and i'm just sitting here wishing that you'd just go away. i think of the dullness i project, i don't know how you even deal. god if i were you i'd be gone, i'd cut my ties from everything like me. things even reminiscent of me i'd write off and kick to the curb. and in the morning i'd wake up, rejoice, and remember all that promise i probably thought i had. but because i'm actually me, like every other day, i'd let it die, let it go.

i see right through myself.

A Gust At Sea; Above Me

you inflated my heart with the densest bliss
a tragic irony that brought me to sink
far beyond the surface of water
i wasn't sure you could get any further

just if you'd paddle out to me
underneath the lonely sea
submerged yet together, we'd want to be wetter

but you're filled with all that glorified suburban stuff
really though, how long until you make that jump?
i'm sure in that if you do you'll never find love
because shut out feelings tend to add up

Bad Guys And Shallow Lies

you're a weapon of mass destruction, thing is you don't belong to me. and you're not even mass yourself. not even a matter. you simply fortify even the smallest passing slights of myself , and for that you are trouble. you're faint and you're free, which is nothing like me. i'm roped and tied and couldn't imagine moving on. you're a miscellaneous additional extra and you've calloused me. then there's the sympathy that you've guided me to toss. i should have taken the first step away days ago, while i had a leg up. now i'm like you and can't move. your god damn feelings got contagious and now i'm like you.

but you're something of substance and i can't let go.

The Clandestine Killed Comfort

i stand in the shower, away. the water hitting me and running down my face. it feels like the rest of my life i could stand there and not know the difference. of course you're on my mind, but it feels much better thinking about you when i'm naked. halfway there. and as the water cascades and descends i can't help but weigh the efforts of our failed relationship. it's all become the past quickly, almost overnight. but i'd rather not leave this space where beauty and heat collide and create an effect that reminds me of our early days together. when they didn't know any better, and we were just relaxing the tensions between us. all the grandiose reasons we gave for trying too hard, and making things more wonderful than we ever knew was possible. an exploratory adventure, we drained it of all it's worth and then left it. and you created the image of an overflowing willingness to heed, and i just took advantage. the fog settles my nerves and i stop thinking about us because clarity isn't the only thing available to score the happenings of all this.

i used to put names on all my failures, now i just place numbers.

Last Day At The Opera

what if there was something that reaches past the ordinary mediocre grand scheme of love.
it's a vapor that hinders causing any clarity i had to disappear.
the reaching seems special with results that break the life between two people.
i've yet to prove it despite the evidence mounting on your every word.
all i hear is lies.
it's backlash from the way we took to get here.

and now i want to let it all go,
cause nothing goes back. the origin is over,
the only scar i have from you's the love within my heart -
a constant reminder of my diminished sense of smart

In Love, I Fell

my memory of you, it was this time last year - i fell in love with you, somewhere between going to your house and the drinking. you would cook hot dogs in the microwave and tell me i could never be fat. i got restless sleeping on the floor, hiding under covers chilled, and i left before the dawn. this was before i lost our solidarity.

after, i wake up now in the middle of sleeping and all i feel is an emptiness. kind of like what you told me about when what's her face left.

and when with you by chris brown comes on the radio i feel his villains, but mostly my own.