- Antimetabole
In the absence of all the effort sitting up straight
Our eyes learned to return to stares
I offered so little then
Cause that’s what I thought you would have said
Spent all evening long
Debasing back to still retracing our missteps
- Bismarck
Maggots in my shoes
Put them on no matter what
Business interview
Don’t recall, poised in empty halls,
Patterned and installed, understated, undissolved
Cleaned up the floor, clean to keep unused
Close the bedroom door, close to coming loose, and what’s the use?
- Diastole
In time we learned to wait
To gather all the leaves
Until the last one fell
Away from the tree
Over my shoulder I saw
You looking back over yours
How easy would it be now
- Dolly Zoom
Feels like that means something
Took our picture when our hair was too long
Used to look so much better than now
Trouble is remembering what was said
The colored pages of the script that we dismissed
A shadow cast, that you never knew me when I was young
- Far Away Cranes
Timed it with the pulse
Coming up again
The time you knew you couldn’t shake it
Still rest to watch it now,
Still chest, and it comes out
This is the sound you couldn’t save
Is it perspective? Is it just knowing where to run?
- Halo Brace
Your focus
Your posture
Your heightened blood pressure
What ill came over?
A soft eulogy you kept mixing up
I was a scarecrow waiting
For company
- Invalids - It's a Pipe Bomb, Jobriath
How tall can we stand
Lean back up on our heels to go
Where we aren’t allowed
Speak sophisticate, trochee and iamb
Honestly, it was our mistake
Mutter apologies under a borrowed sigh
Read out on our face
- Ironic Dysphemism
Stain set in a day
Washed to fade
Watched and walked away
With some forgettable charm
Regrettably long overstay
Tried to trace back to find ourselves again
Used to the silence
- J Whiting, From Our Hearts We Send Thee
The best of us believed
If we hadn’t stumbled
we’d still have a chance
To pick up the pieces
But just as we’ve seen
The gust came too strong and it blew it away
And we know it’s not coming back
Now we’ve got to behave
- Satellite
We learned to stop staring at the floor
We learned to stop hoping it would offer us our guidance anymore
There was a turn before you froze
We all knew it was something when
Everyone was backing up
(I know it won’t matter, I won’t keep bringing it up)
So we’ll sit in silence once more
So we offered silent answers
- School Social
Dragged me up
Cummerbund
I tried taking you out
Showed up on my bike
You look lovely tonight
And we chased the daylight
Guess it got away
- Sherman Is Connector
What are you gonna do this weekend?
What are you gonna do with your life?
Standing next to a bookcase
Standing next to a mirror
Standing over the balcony at night
Saved up
Change for a whole year
- Steinborgium
Once we admitted we knew nothing
There was a place back home
We all went to find what we’d lost
Let the table and its chairs
All lean the way they will
We lean the way we
Will most easily
Let ourselves fall
- The Horse Raced Hardest Lost
Watched the nails, made sure they stayed down
Watched it all, lowered into the ground
The fountain gone, just a baron concrete hull
And always there was fear of forever drying out
But when it rained, it wasn’t quite same
The wind would chill and the clouds came sulking in
But no amount of will or force
- The World Is Square
On self-improvement
We spent no longer than a day
Gathering up the things we never use
And no fewer than three weeks letting it go
Things we no longer need
That used to mean everything
On self-reliance
- Tiny Coffins
Back seat, windows up
The motion makes you sick
Forehead leaned against
The coldest pane, collecting as you breathe
The empty overpass, with three more to go, two hours in
And every song was saying it, beating it in, beat it to death
And you decided then that this time was different,
- Ursine Valor
Remember when the hurricane blew against your door?
And the next morning everything was out of place?
Remember when you had your back up against a wall?
All the blocks you couldn’t break down, you’re breaking up
We built it up, waited for nothing
But it began to fall, put the pieces in place
But it wasn’t the same