Keep you cigarettes and your bike rides and your middle shelf whiskey
But keep it all to under covers
Hide it up in your designer pillow case
Before you hurt someone else

Oh keep your nightmares and melodies that resonate all through the dark
Keep your silence and your wonder
Wrap it up silk and ribbon laced
Before you break someone’s heart

Keep your stars and fresh laundry, keep your ***** bathroom sink
Keep your bright eyes and your mystery
Encase it inside your hard drive
Because you’re kiss is tattoo ink

Keep your smirks and your ashes, keep your whispers, and your linens and skin
Keep your hallowed muddied hallways, and your misty charcoal eyes
But lock your coveted front door
Let no one within or inside

Keep your photographs and heirlooms, keep your laughter to yourself
Keep your banter and your video games
In safe or in a dungeon
Just make sure they ruin no one’s health

Keep your Prozac and your cauldron, keep your fingertips at bay
Keep your snores and your embrace
Somewhere that’s simple and alone
Or you’ll ****** another Juliet this way

Keep your promises of grandeur, and your sidewalks full of lust
Keep your fire escapes and lonely places
Out of reach
Or all who touch will turn to dust

Keep your valor keep your pseudo-wisdom, put it with your white t-shirts
Keep your childhood and weaponry
Underground safe and sound
Before someone else gets hurt

Keep your lips and teeth and syllables; keep your bookcase safe and strong
Keep your nothingness, keep your beauty
Hide it all behind a mask
Or another lover will have to sing this song

It was vicious in the shadows, no dream catchers to polish your shine
It was lonely in the corners of love
It’s beautiful when we combine
I know it’s been months now, but your face is still enough

The tears have ceased to flow wearing your badge of honor
The sleepless nights are stripped with other knights
The days are now sanded and softer
There’s a street bar named desire and its sign is glowing bright

But I’d turn my future inside out to be in your arms if you inquired
I’d burn my fortress to the ground
I’d watch while it expired
For without you, it’s always lost not found

Why do you always know what to say
And never when to say it?
Why do you always reassure
When nothing is amiss?

Why do you always pave my way
When my path is perfect
Miles of clear pasture
But never when I’m lost in the abyss?

Why do you always warm my blood in the sun
When my skin is golden bronze
And leave me to freeze on new years eve
When the world is winter?

Why do you protect me from the kind hearts of loved ones
And never from  others who wish me harm?
Shielded from the wind but not the rain I believe
That burn you ignite is bitter

I wish for you at 9 pm when the bars begin to swell
My voice is hoarse from the cigarettes and wishing at the well
I find you there at midnight by the metro station and Liberty Bell
My legs are strong from sprinting from Bethlehem to hell

I taste you in the morning when you have not come to keep
My lips so sore from kissing company in my sleep
I leave you in the afternoon when you wander but do not seek
My heart is breathless from chasing you down these empty streets

You touch me in the sunrise as daylight falls across this room
Your lips are weak from biting in the cover of the moon
You betray me in the evening, for the evening begins too soon
Your hands are wrecked from calculating the days until we are doomed

You adore me in the city’s spring your smile open wide
Your arms are stretched out beckoning across the horizon and skyline
You waste your honesty as autumn sullies the joy of the 8th avenue line
Your eyes are heavy with insomnia as surely as this pain is mine

I called for you in the dark hours of the early morning that echoed endlessly
My cheeks were flushed in blush and the anxiousness of eternity
I met you at the boulder behind the stone wall where we once shared insanity
My lungs could breathe little but smoke and uncertainty

You met your Juliet that month somewhere in the chill and dark
Your mind was at ease from pursuit if only life was such a simple arc
You drifted upon the waves of confusion for a time while we made each other art
Your stomach hurt from the flowers you ate in the Eden of the park

I awoke you from your slumber to all that exists in the break of war
My ears were picking up radio waves from the allies at the shore
I took you back to the pillow you craved, though it was a different chore
My veins were amplified by ******* and love is such a bore

I waited for you in August, spread across your linen sheets
Our eyes are locked on the calendar counting the days to our defeat
I betrayed my post in October too offender now to do ought but retreat
Our whispers never ventured past the barricade we built in our release

We vanished as January bathed the world in frost and splendor
Our songs were over played and our words lacked the potency of forever
We wrote letters unsent in scribbled ink that would always remain returned to the sender
Our handwriting had been illegible since September

We spared one another the grace of good-byes and false promises
Our teeth were sharpened for fresh bars and unknown kisses
We would wander sometimes through the haunts where we used to feel delicious
Our memories aching with the scent of a memory that will never miss us

The blur of the subway reflection inspired me to
Inspired me to, to believe in
The crimson blood that flowed within you
You and your hollow valentines card veins

The bite of the winter wisps of wind asked me to
Asked me to, to remember if
Your embrace was the dagger sugar coated blue
The first icicles to fall in January’s pain

The drip and dance of the winter medication forced me to
Forced me to, to make love against
The memories that held me close within the heart’s decadent hue
I never asked for his real name

The salt and citrus that embraced the tequila motivated me to
Motivated me to, to waste tears upon
Your deep violet royalty and my role as the ingenue
I only wished to offer you a red paper crane

The pallor of my skin introduced me to
Introduced me to, to the truth
And nothing but the truth, so help me God, I cooed
Drive me somewhere beautiful, a place I cannot blame

The final echo of your weary voice released me to
Released me to, to an apocalyptic city
The street was reduced to a cemetery so I choose the avenue
The four horsemen galloped in the sanctuary of the bus lane

The loneliness of restless half-hearted dreaming lead me to
Lead me to, to a crystal forgotten river
It stretched through the city and the city’s shoes
Winding in and out like a vagrant gone insane

A switching staircase indebted me to
Indebted me, to the essence of humanity
It explained all is made so that it can be broken through
No river shall ever flow without rain

The bright of the afternoon convinced me to
Convinced me to, to stand before the mirror
Bright eyes and shaking lips sparkled wet with diamond dew
She blamed cupid’s arrow for it was surely improperly aimed

A lover, half asleep and half in dreams, insisted me to
Insisted me to, to scream until I collapse
It was the only sound I could honestly make to begin anew
He promised without shame

The blare of the harsh siren in the night awoke me to
Awoke me to, to a dream I once believed
The vivid coloration and forms were an artistic witch’s brew
I’ve been to love, so I’ve been to war and I shall never be the same