You class traitors and social policy designers Coats with pockets so deep Stacked with the bodies of dead coal miners Penny pitching at the home of your kitchen maid Raided and rancid with the princesses of the valley Curiously mowing your own lawns, giggling at fuzzy dice Brahmin toff Bribing all those with cut and dry authority Your prose is so loaded If your car wheels get stuck in the snow You spoiled brats will smash the windows of your limo When you walk to the river With your attack dog turning against you Circling the treasonous breeze All these mistakes were yours to make Bestowed upon you by your forefathers Burn Croesus to the stake

I have to ask what it’s like to be at the top of your head Someone whose thoughts consistently revolve around What it must be like to be your friend Someone to walk around with around the peckerwood towns The rest of the world may have forgotten about you Being held in low esteem means you have nothing to prove I’m in the same situation too That’s why I thought that you might understand Waking up and the pillowcase is all wet Binging on stale popcorn alone in the theater complex Puking it all out and weeping to The Birthday Party Walk home in the rain, blue drenched in green, mixed like envy and shame But you’ve learned to find comfort in your loneliness I was like you in that ancient ephemeral summer But once you’ve lost your only friend A part of you desperately searches for another See, I haven’t left the house since the beginning of the year You got a heart to mend and an ego to feed You read books and watch dumb movies And above all, cultivate a life that you can be proud of Oh, but I never had these feelings until I wrote about them I never had these feelings until I wrote about them I never had these feelings until I wrote about them Perhaps I shouldn’t have shared my history Maybe you’re only drawn to the despair if it’s tinged with glory I apologize, I’m being far too unkind There are no faces you can recognize in the looking glass See, I haven’t talked to my dad since you last reached out He’s almost out at the bar or at one of his jobs And I’ve been less than a mediocre son I don’t think I even deserve to be a hired gun Oh, but I never had these feelings until I wrote about them I never had these feelings until I wrote about them I never had these feelings until I wrote about them So I have to ask what it’s like to be at the top of your head

When your skin blushes up And your kindness is stretched out Antidotes of adventure can’t save you now I’ve held your butterflies in the septic tank The way it boils at the heat of a notification And simmers down at the sight of quality All your heroes have been put down Don’t think I don’t mind your lapses in attention Your fish tank glances across the storyboard halls And I love you and I love your wife Though I wish I was her in the afterlife I rub the bruise in a little further I advertise how I’m maligned The world is my satellite You always sound so dreary In your wake-up calls to the milkman I know you were told you could be anyone But that’s only if you don’t care about the people’s sum It’s hard to rip off the dollar store bandaid In this marketplace of expensive emotions Getting sick from the stench of my soup I go back to bed with my sheets of navy blue Like an infant with no toy to chew It’s like I’m a calamine addict Someone who’s enamored with numbing the bite

I am a man of piss poor means A stiff of a shell of a former child prodigy Keeping my face long and my body lean And I shouldn’t be mourning all that which I’ve lost I know it’s only a hassle But that doesn’t make me feel any better I lie awake and try to recall how I became a fomite I know it’s only a hassle But it’s hard not to read into every slight Tinged with the inevitable, that I’ll be forgotten I am the model of modest altruism Bright and warmer than my lively demeanor suggests With all my secrets kept abreast And I’d shouldn’t be mourning all that which I’ve lost I know it’s only a hassle But that doesn’t make me feel any better And all the weekday trophies Don’t know it’s only a hassle They keep their sense of justice high and their morality low With envelopes full of fundraiser money

If I was a man of the world I could express my love in five vowels and three consonants But so many have surpassed that bar before me I’ve never held your hand But I know our hearts beat at the same time I wrote hundreds of discarded odes At the first sight of your smile If I was a man of the world I could express my love in five vowels and three consonants But so many have surpassed that bar before me And my affection for you Will last long after I’m alive I just wish my heart Could protect you like the stars in the sky If I was a man of the world I could express my love in five vowels and three consonants But your adoration means even this will make you happy

I wear a bright pink mask When I wander my town With a river rushing through the underground I wear a bright pink mask Some people wish they could bask in it I go back home and I’m baby blue Misconstrued with something to prove My inner facade Is dependent on the mockingbird guard If the city’s full of people like me Who escaped small-town hypocrisy I could never be one of them with a wallet so hollow The mask gets sewn onto my chalky face Plastered in waste and a duct tape cross I bind my secrets in two layers of cotton You have to wonder what’s all the fuss As if authenticity means a lack of trust To all those who prescribed expired ways of getting high It’s never as glamorous as it seems When you have the dough, they’ll let you roll with the game Pick your life apart and you’re forced to fix it with purple glue Aren’t you all at the age where resentments turn into forgiveness You can repeat the truth An objective one with dusty shelves of proof But it’s not up to you It’s decided by their caricature of God

I wouldn’t be so wise to blame all my troubles on you I got a blushing fist of self pity to use to put a hole in your truths It’s questionable how you got this far You got off so many times at the attention towards your false starts You worship at the porcelain god’s temple Can’t afford to stain fine china You can’t pick and choose between victim and survivor You’re getting far too picky about the girls you disassemble I don’t care to recall the first time we met All the bodies you claim never to regret No, you don’t suffer from the paradox of doubt You collapse under your ego with or without No one maims me except you You get away with it cause I got no prove If I’m a boy and my dad’s a man Then keep shoving your bills down the drain while you can Well, I could’ve hung myself on the flagpole I could’ve dragged your body across the front page news But I’ve seen the damage words misconstrued will do So I’ll keep our secret if you stop putting your hands where your prick tells you to I wouldn’t be so wise to blame all my troubles on you I got a blushing fist of store pity to use to put a hole in your truths It’s questionable how you got this far You got off so many times at the attention towards your false starts No one maims me except you You get away with it cause I got no prove If I’m a boy and my dad’s a man Then keep shoving your bills down the drain while you can

You always open the car door for me Dust the fast food crumbs out the crack of my seat And though the stereo doesn’t work And the new car smell tree doesn’t reflect its worth I love it when we drive past the great wheel Watch the food trucks colors reflect off the distant sunlight The breeze has a crunch and the air has a chill And if four layers won’t work, then what else will Rub my red hands until they get to peach It’s odd knowing your name isn’t the leech You do drain the color out of my face But that’s due to affection, not me being frightened and in haste We stop at a crowded restaurant you used to be a regular at With the line full of monochrome and blue light You order me a chocolate croissant, you say it’s your favorite And I cry like a martyr while they’re cleaning the stalls

This world wants to bury you in the ground And you have every right to be mad The storm looms over your soul Mourning over what they want you to have Don’t pay any mind to what they have to say We can be our own lights guiding the way Know it’s not your fault Don’t burden yourself with the blame The waves try to block you from reaching the shore Take as long as you need to I’ll be here waiting for you There’s nothing wrong with the way you feel There are so many people who try to steal What you have but you should know They couldn’t touch it if they wanted to

Driving past Lake Union The water looks different Perhaps it’s because autumn has arrived Or because your warm face now isn’t If I’m being honest, it’s because I don’t feel the same way about you Can’t help thinking about the logistics of love It seems too cruel to be cynical Driving past Thomas street park To observe the slides that give you nothing but Rashes that require heavy doses of calamine Run to the castle upon the hill Maybe it’s best for me to realize That you’ll never feel the same way I’ve lived long enough not to avoid rejection Driving past True Love art gallery A little girl rides a broom over the sea The waves come crashing above the city Everyone else is pretty but me Is it too much to ask the world if I’m enough I know so many others who truly have it rough Just reassure me that I might be worthy of your love Of your love

With my hands caked with dry blood Painted in bold strokes for the effigies Walking the streets at the rapture of dawn Crossing candy wrapper road And I’m not really wanting to feel wanted Because there’s targets on my lower back Razzia by the Elizabeth river They’ve culled open the nonprofit, they’re fixing up the spokesman My lungs are rubbed raw with self-satisfaction I can see the invisible world Crumbling against a coke waterfall Tarry haze drips against the banks Razzia by the Elizabeth river Forget about the screen test, remember your paycheck They did a profile on the launderer squad They built a statue for the poster child She’s moving not too far from her hometown Hurricane bile’s now trauma nostalgia Razzia by the Elizabeth river Prayers are answered at the whims of the caprice

The smoke sprouts from the engine Laced with maple syrup An impulsive decision Stranded in the slums The roads laid bare amidst the congestion The wind tugs at my hair My love’s feet drag in circles as he squawks at himself Hoarse profanities and coarse Southern expressions pepper Paranoia, a loss of joy that was drained out of your pores He kicks the tire, his foot is throbbing, I pour my soda all over it for the ice Is this what you wanted to see me haunted The rain strikes with the clock It sets the scene for a second act of misanthropy He whistles a pastiche of memories on summer streets to soothe me Caricatures of pedestrians encounter us With haughty condolences “Are you and your old man ok?” They’d drive by with all their sympathies If I laid out my situation My dad’s working the night shift My mom will greet me with an open fist I was supposed to be at work and now I’m supposed to be home Is this what you wanted to see me haunted The trees are stunning at night Your jaw will drop at the desolation My love and I amble on the side of the road He’s too enervated to raise his jacket above me The water fell like my arms Nothing could shield me from my own deception One bar of reception Just to encounter a shadow with loquacious fangs The emptiness of my hands Emphasized their soft lines My face lacked that jocose inclination Is this what you wanted to see me haunted The air threw itself at me Wrapped around my lungs I was warm with the heat of languor We gained a bar The streetlight looked down on me as my tongue shriveled up My head was ripped open with a red roar I had to make sure he was alright But my skin was even whiter than I had ever wished it was The chills hit a crescendo and knocked me down Is this what you wanted to see me haunted Is this what you wanted to see me haunted