1. |
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befriend the orchid
lure in a lifeline
laughing and licking
with a dusty smile that never dies
befriend the orchid
show it your spleen
there’s love to be found in hate
your fingers push and come out clean
befriend the orchid
swallow its mold
caress through its aching veins
the orchid groans and glows like gold
who are the lonely?
who are their kin?
you etch out a rune into that stem,
pretend it means a thing
why would you stay?
what love can heal the quiet
by its silent decay?
what babbling brook that beckons
like a lost dog twitching its nose?
how would you know?
why would you go?
and what would you find?
what warmth worth all that worthlessness
behind your bare eyes?
why wash your dirty hair
when you are clean enough to survive?
aren’t you alive?
why would you try?
well, you stormed out your home
for all the smoke that its decrepit walls
had once known
for all the seasick songs you’d ever beamed
like beacons of hope
it’s good on your own
just like years ago
and a devil was born
beside the blinding highway
in a thicket of thorns
a devil with its tattered skin
the earth bends, blisters, and blows
but how would you know
when no one’s calling you home?
help me, please, I am lost in space
I’ve burned the truth just to lose its weight
I’ll make it worth your while
if you show me the guileless way
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2. |
Covered in Electrodes
04:28
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I’ll kill your altruism
with crude oil, glass, and turpentine
if you want to see how heaven
will look when space collides
cause you are buoyant with faith and reverie
it must be so much stomach gas
you’re a father yet obliged to Christ
through plasma and through plastic decay
you are drying paint filmed for TV
and the ratings are great
twin giraffe lips shape your bedsores
and they smile like a child
at the break of the day
covered in electrodes to measure what’s real
why not get your money’s worth
you don’t care and I’m not scared of the answer
so the paths we trace are razorblades
to slice straight through the earth
but I’ll kill your courtesy
if given a quarter of the chance
when you want to see how hell
will freeze over in your hands
it’s not like God is watching what you do,
deciding the truth
he’s just baiting you to disobey his rules
try and keep your cool
the more that you see kindness in your eyes
the bigger the lie
cement shoes take whole hours just to dry
and don’t you know that you’re a hydrogen bomb?
you could be worshipped like a golden calf
but you’re still built to harm
you could be anything at all
you could be proud, you’d just be wrong
twin giraffe lips shape your bedsores
and they smile like a child
sick as sin at the dawn
covered in electrodes to measure what’s real
why not get your money’s worth
you don’t care and I’m not scared of the answer
so the paths we trace are razorblades
to slice straight through the earth
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3. |
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fossil was a friend of mine
so strange it meant anything
emergency upon the pale green wing
subterfuge in the jewelry aisle
for my CCTV dream
thinking nothing
fossil was a friend of mine
in sunken-ship shades of blue
a winding wander toward the warmth of youth
videotapes of marching bands
shaky hands and chattering teeth
thinking nothing, far too young to be at peace
oh, please tell me why you’re leaving
have you simply played your part?
are you one of them, who tiptoes through the dark?
or in the light, do you believe
that nothing binds and nothing bleeds
and do you play the bigger man so preemptively?
a winter night, a winning smile
convinced me that life’s a game
it’s not the cards you’re dealt, it’s how you play
I’d never been touched by God before
but I wanted something there
if I can’t compare
yet all those nights perched over death
can force an unworthy hand
a shot at life, I lunged, I hatched my plan
so when fossil beat me to adulthood
it took a couple weeks to learn
if I can’t compare, where the hell else do I turn?
oh, please tell me why you’re leaving
have you simply played your part?
are you one of them, who tiptoes through the dark?
or are you frightened stiff like me
that nothing binds and nothing bleeds
and do you play the bigger man so preemptively?
the wedding of two friends who’d stayed
I showed up dressed to the nines
a trojan horse, the ravages of time
but every face was new to me
so I left a drunken shell
you deserve yourself
yet fossil was a friend of mine
with an open palm to the wind
running like the world someday begins
and all I hope’s that the city’s warm
when the winter reappears
you deserve yourself, you deserve each rosy year
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4. |
The Colourless Man
04:54
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balls deep inside the snake of Eden
the bugs beneath my skin roam free
I split the wound within the skyline
and drain the Tigris to the sea
yeah, Gabriel won’t touch his horn
unless he gets a call from me
and each time you feel the spit slip through you
or heave a sigh of disbelief
I pull back a bead on my abacus
and I smile for my coming relief
I watched the future sprawl toward you
driving drunk to Bethlehem
I sold Jael her first vibrator
and smuggled E for David’s men
I sowed the seeds of all you are
and I have forgotten what it meant
and I see you soused in all your comfort
I hear your aching groan of peace
so I stifle a laugh of gratitude
cause I know we will soon be released
did you know I don’t recognize anyone?
did you know I’m inherently wrong?
did you know I am going home
before very long?
and oh, did you know you could save yourself
and still leave this world unloved?
I thought that was your working hypothesis
I thought we had agreed on that much
I thought that’s why you’d made peace with the end
to be free from the start
to be hidden and hungered for
to be someone apart, which you aren’t
did you know how I dreamt for so long of coiling myself
like a venomous snake in your bed?
just to wound something worthy, to tarnish a veil
but never again
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5. |
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I torched your family home
in a desperate fit of ungrateful hate
I stole the mash notes, teacups, and black mold spores
and I hurled them in a coming hurricane
and there’ll be no reckoning
no dawning knowledge I’m to blame
for guilt is not so focussed, it rattles random
like a machine gun spins on a weathervane
whatever will you do when God is found on the moon
waiting for the chance to leap to Earth
to burn up on re-entry like the judgment we’re awaiting
like that bitter sense of worth
cause I torched your family home
and now I’ll never weep again
there’s just the grinding gears of a life well lived
the machinery of hope and lust and shame
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6. |
Evie Keeps On Laughing
05:22
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I do all that I can to break down her faith
I just swivel and sway, I’m her own writhing wraith
I do all that I can to break down her faith
I don’t eat, I just feed on her nebulous fate
but Evie keeps on laughing
and she’ll keep laughing til her dying day
I have seen myself out of most facets of life
yeah, I leave through the ceiling with spit in my eyes
I have seen myself out of most facets of life
I stopped paying utilities, I nailed down the blinds
but Evie keeps on laughing
and it is fracturing half of time
it’s so nice to be numb when you’re infinite
it’s so useful to be naïve
there is mold in the souls of the intimate
and it never can spread to me
I have been tossed around like a chew toy
I’ve lost the right to care if it hurts
and she is cleansed in her warm water voices
she is an allergen upon the Earth
and in the alleyway, I catch a taste
what blood is truly worth
and so I spit into the sink, and watch it flow
back into her
soft, sullen soul implores you just let go
(please, please)
long, lonely limbs implore you just give in
(please, please)
and I do all that I can to break down her faith
there is something ulterior that hides in her face
I do all that I can to break down her faith
cause it must be laid bare, what she’s trying to debase
but Evie keeps on laughing
and I laugh too, it’s just never the same
soft, sullen soul implores you just let go
(please, please)
long, lonely limbs implore you just give in
(please, please)
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7. |
A Self-Help Guide
05:26
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and in being a beast to gut and clean
a sunfish in a sea of chlorine
you have every right to require stainless steel
and gassed out your mossy, rotting home
you are worth at least ten pumps alone
you should know in your heart you’re worth a taste of the real
it’s true, brimstone should bend for you
without your presence, who would we live vicariously through?
there will be fine flakes scattered in the morning dew
cause Heaven’s full and Egypt’s hard to get to
panic and pull the fire alarm in your dreams
maybe then someone will tell you what anything means
and as the asthmatic dad of man
everything turns out as you plan
you’re just blessed with the inability to tell
and in being a beast to be defaced
you deserve a butcher with grace
you deserve to be strung up behind the chapel bells
it’s true, brimstone should bend for you
without you as the horse of lust, how else would we pull through?
there will be fine flakes scattered in the morning dew
cause Heaven’s full and Egypt’s hard to get to
panic and pull the fire alarm in your dreams
maybe then someone will tell you what anything means
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8. |
The Blood Brother
04:05
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blood brother
crime behind the moon
the hand is pierced and weeping
the violence of noxious spring
blood brother
sun bursts on your skin
today you slip through Qumran
tomorrow a nerveless thing
blood brother
underneath the dew
children run toward the marshes
with fire in their eyes, I know
they’re only children,
they’re worth that watery home
sanguine sky has swallowed your soul
emaciated, feverish, and folded
twice below the dark, thrice in light
and I am not alone
I am only awaiting
blood brother
death behind the moon
the spirit speaking through you
the red like the burning truth
blood brother
underneath the dew
children run toward the marshes
with fire in their eyes, I know
they’re only children,
they’re worth that watery home
sanguine sky has swallowed your soul
emaciated, feverish, and folded
twice below the dark, thrice in light
and I am not alone
I am only awaiting
specter
specter
take me where you go
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9. |
Rhododendron
04:20
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then paint me crimson and kill the sun
(lightning above, bled to death and so young)
kill your betrayer, push in his tongue
(lightning above, bled to death and so young)
you’re touched by something I’ll never see
(touched by a truth it’s not in me to feel)
you sew up my mouth
when the blood starts pouring out
then paint me crimson and kill the sun
(lightning above, bled to death and so young)
kill your betrayer, push in his tongue
(lightning above, bled to death and so young)
you’ve fucked with something I’ll never be
(touched by a truth you will never reveal)
you sew up my mouth
when the blood starts pouring out
you said every road you’ve walked
will in time corrupt your legs
but so pale and bitter,
I heard “don’t leave”
you blessed the son with a kiss
and you dressed his scarring knees
you said all the warmth you’ve sought
will in time corrupt your chest
all your love will destroy you,
ragged child of the dawn
you blessed the son with a kiss
and you dressed his scarring knees
you knew what it means to leave
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10. |
Foxhole
03:48
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what if in a foxhole you play God?
will you sing the ragged sky into dawn?
did you know your hope has always spurred me on?
did you know that without you the world is wrong?
that without you, life does not just carry on?
seven seas of death and loss
rage against the shores of every life
but something tells me
you are not quite finished here
and you’re worth the pains of living
so neither am I
what if when the lifeboats finally come
you should find that there is room for everyone?
will you take the oars and sail toward the night?
toward the miracle of ever being alive?
did you know I see it there in your flowerbed eyes?
seven seas of death and loss
rage against the shores of every life
but something tells me
you are not quite finished here
and you’re worth the pains of living
so neither am I
and you’re worth the pains of living
so neither am I
oh, you’re worth the pains of living
so neither am I
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Celogen Calgary, Alberta
I have seen everything and known everyone and I am still not tired!
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