the lion isn't sacred when not sleeping near the lamb
it is evil when it eats, unless it's feeding from the damned
all the children painted diagrams of god upon their hands
hoping somewhere on this shaking earth, they could find a place to stand.
it's a tyrant to the foreigners who've never seen the land
they feel safer than a statue when they've got a spear in hand,
it is pregnant with the fury that the pain in life demands
yes it's fear--but it's a fear that understands.
and what's left is a heartbeat speaking,
"hands off your fate, child, you'll bury yourself in mistakes."
like a dream that i had of lost faith, it fades
away but still thunders onward.
every pulse was a hand with it's palm up
fed with bodies and bread soaked in blood.
someday, somewhere it'll leave but, tell me, someone, where does it go?
what tied our hands tight to the train tracks, then backed off slowly?
what does the heart say?
"see the reverse. there's an answer there."
i am the moth-drenched love of dead mules
as stable as sand in a windstorm
and i shake like a spider in the rain when you say,
"my, my, the ways i've changed since then--the ways i've changed."
and all I ever say is "i'm..."
it hits like a brick to the back of your head
like, goodbye, five times, one for each finger
and you say, "my, my, the ways i've changed since then--the ways i've changed."
and all i ever say is, "i'm tired. i'm tired."
we turned our water into whining, shouting,
"let us be like christ!"
but then the whining turned to wonder,
and the wonder turned to ice
once we were graceful steeples,
hands held upward and eyes wide in suspense
ow we are tangled like intruders,
in the wires of the fence.
for a fence is built to protect what lies inside of it.
do you still feel sick? because i do.