The broken wheel comes clicking round,
Once more we brought you back here.
The slower sins that we commit
Are the ones out here we wear
And I found time, let them drip from my tongue
And begged “No more. No, more.”

My tracks had led the wanderer in,
They don’t hear the wheel, his call,
No barrow of ripened fruit
No need to care of rot, no fear
Of hounds that hide through doorways,
Those who enjoy the freefall.

Such grey is comfort to me now,
A wheel, a ring; round, round, round.
A court of sparrows told me so
And sentenced me, and I was blown
To in-between, blessed mediocrity,
Away from the rock-face hewn.

I am not the last of mine,
(All my steps pulled back, refrain)
We come together, over, over,
Relishing in where we’ve been
If it is wrong, pluck out my eye,
But I will only crave the taste again. 

I have not bought a train ticket.
I just wanted a cigarette.
A bird is a bird,
Lure me out again.
I thought you were purifying,
But sweetheart, oh how my hands ache.

Go get your car keys and drive me
Straight down to the sea.
I can wait for waves.
You and I can lie on the sand.
It’s an open invitation;

A gathering of broken shells,
Abandoned buildings.
(Bring your own backbone)
I think that I’m watching instead
Of waking up with a notebook,

Holes written into the affair.
Decades of dawn reign.
Ask an empty house
And the walls shall creak in reply.
Preparing for what we can’t see,
She wants God after eighteen years. 

There are two ways to tear acts into scenes:
By actions, and by view.
My eyes are not your eyes
Nor touch, skin,
We don’t share your empty hands.

Lights, I am upstage right,
And my lines go unscripted
My mouth unpuppeteered.
A slow same leaning in:
You’re an audience on stage.
I laugh; he repents; you whine.
Change scene, those sounds
You had tried to entice
Not your work but his,
Another boy, part in the play.

My teeth ache.
Your eyes burn holes.
I long for alone,
Can’t get it at all.
 

Counting the tiles on the ceiling,
I thank whoever is Up There for
The sweet gift of music, as I drown
Sobs and cries leaking through walls.
Even here I can’t shake them off,
Clinging as acrid smoke to clothes,
To my things, my hair, to my skin.

Each tile is another prayer to leave
My head, a prayer to transcend
Higher than human consciousness,
For touches, for tongues,
(And they rarely get answered)
A prayer that the chemicals
Will keep me distracted.

Laughing burns the throat.
The mixer’s become a joke.
We all know just where this is going
And I hope you feel at fault,
Like the turning earth never
Meant more than what you said. 

I can’t love. I can barely even like.

You made it hurt.
My lips won’t work any more;
There’s only a fine line
Between you and I,
I crossed paths with a black heart.
It’s an ache in the hollow,
It grows with the things you swallow,
It’s always been a game of demand and supply.