1. |
Orientation & the Oath
03:47
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2. |
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I went down to the battlefield and found I only had a trumpet in my hand. / A tiny joke, I thought at first, but now I know that it could be what you had planned. / But if you don’t need anything / Why would you ask for help from me again?
I need a sign, a rock on fire, a jar of wine, some sort of fleece to keep inside my head. / ‘Cuz I’m unsure and will be until I learn the proper way to raise the dead. / But if you can’t bring anything / Would you take this cup from me again?
There’s a peace in four long years, a decade each, that seems to be what you had planned / Where you could take this mess of arteries and veins and turn it all into a man. / And I know you don’t need anything / But could you please just speak through me again?
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3. |
Decussation
04:34
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You were clever as a fox / When you set it off / When you set your tail on fire / And ran right through my field of wheat / I felt seventeen / As the plumes of smoke climbed higher / And bled into the atmosphere / It was so sincere / Like the sunlight through the shutters / And all your skin was made of glass / A translucent past / Displaying every color.
Walls began to fall in time / Like in ‘89 / Sewing east and west together / A patchwork meant to cover two / In a brilliant hue / With the crooked seams we threaded / But now and then you feel far off / As if you’ve been caught / In something you never wanted / So winter settles over me / And always seems to be / Just cold enough to keep me coming back.
So decussate the tracks that lay / So deep inside my head / And innervate the words you say / With what I need again / ‘Cuz buried in our fingertips / You’ll find reception halls / That together with our nervous lips / Make half of what we know is true.
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4. |
Silhouettes in Smoke
03:08
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Silhouettes in smoke / A black hole / A catalyst / That stirs beneath your throat / My white coat / A metal disc / I press against your back / To listen past / The violins / And analyze the staff / Of the symphony / Between your ribs.
Every crooked line / That folds to form a mountain top / Was sketched by the Divine / With electricity in blood / A meticulous receipt / Of everything you’ve bought and kept / That I’ve been taught to read / And translate into life or death.
So say what you really mean / In Morris code / I feel in your wrists and feet / An SOS / I swore an oath that I would keep between us / Unless your enemies prove too much for me / To handle on my own.
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5. |
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Here’s the part where I tell you that I’m falling for her again. / It’s the heart, it’s the selfless nature I know that you wont understand. / With a knife, there’s a romance on a tightrope between life and death. / It’s a fight, it’s a slow dance and my hands are about to commit.
I’m gonna burn my letters and fold my bridges back down. / I’m gonna make this island my home or watch myself slowly drown. / I’m gonna find the one that I love and tell her the truth: / It’s all my fault and I’m sorry for the hell I’ve put us through.
Here’s the part where you panic and start stripping off all of your clothes. / Now the floor is a canvas for the things that I never will own. / In the heat of the moment, you whisper inside of my ear. / You’re a whore and I know it but you tell me what I want to hear.
I’m gonna burn my letters and fold my bridges back down. / I’m gonna make this island my home or watch myself slowly drown. / I’m gonna find the one that I love and tell her the truth: / It’s all my fault and I’m sorry for the hell I’ve put us through.
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6. |
Half the Man
04:09
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What would you say if I told you all I want to do is run? / What would you say if I gave you what I thought were good reasons? / What would you do with your hands lying inside that hospital bed? / What would you say if I told you I don’t know what else to do?
I don’t understand how you could take pride in a grandson who’s nothing but unique, / ‘Cuz I don’t find comfort when I think of the fact that I don’t know anyone like me. / And I don’t understand how you could take pride in a boy who turned out to be this weak, / ‘Cuz I gotta be honest, I don’t think I’m half the man you thought that I would be.
Would you tell me to turn and look at my mother crying at night through anxious prayers? / Or tell me to make a fist like my father and work 9 to 5 until I’m dead? / Or tell me to wipe the sweat from my forehead and ignore the blood just like you did? / Or whisper a song about how you love me and tell me I’m part of some big plan?
Tell me I’m part of some big plan.
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7. |
Two Versus Ten
08:37
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Two versus ten / We were sent / I was in the majority. / It’s hard to pretend / That I’m not / Too terrified to breathe / But I can’t trust you / To slay all of my giants for me.
No one could resist the milk and honey dripping from your tongue; / But I was transfixed by the truth that it was mixed with sweat and blood.
A snake on the staff / Of a man / Who was healing in your name / A stitch that they sewed / In my coat / Doesn’t make me the same. / And I can’t trust you / With pure ambition as my faith.
No one would believe this landscape could devour me alive; / But I began to see that all my strength was fiction in your eyes.
All of the signs / And the plagues / And the parting of the sea / Slipped like a ghost / Through the walls / Of my faulty memory / But I could trust you / With your hands nailed to a tree.
No one could foresee the depth to which I’d sink beneath your blood / But I’ve started to believe that the drowning was designed for my own good.
Hallelujah to the One who transforms dust into the marrow in our bones. / Hallelujah to the One who pushes blood into our small arterioles. / Hallelujah to the One who creates wine out of the water in our lungs. / Hallelujah to the One who brings forgiveness through the movement of our tongues. / Hallelujah, I have finally turned back into the dust that made my bones.
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8. |
Remediation
02:08
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