I’ve made it through the darkest days
Through long and lonely nights
But not without both tears and scars
Which dimmed my blinding light
I’ve lost myself within myself
Each time I think I’m found
I sink back to the bottom
As in open air, I drown

Surrounded by the ones I love
I still feel all alone
Each time I feel I’m healing
I’m cut right back to the bone
The only things I’ve wanted
Are what matter most of all
But every time I venture close
Much farther do I fall

“I’ll be fine”
“I’ll be OK”
“One day, all will be well”
It feels like lies
But still I fight my way through mental hell
Even as I wonder if some day will ever be
Sometimes, I feel I only hope
For what can never be

Once upon a long ago
Yet lingering each day
The mind confines what heart defines
Then twists it every way
Forming mountains out of mole hills
Crafting worries from thin air
‘Til the things which should not vex me
Cast my heart into despair

In my surety, I worry
In my bravery, I fear
In my strength, I fashion weakness
‘Til my joy sheds sorrow’s tears
While the victories fought long for
Find defeat within my mind
I convince myself unworthy
Of what I want most to find

If any hope should cease to matter
If any wish should cease to be
If any dream should wake unwoven
It’s because I’ve doubted me
But when years have brought but failure
Every hope shot down in turn
Each broken dream and ungranted wish
Leaves my confidence to burn

If faith can move a mountain
Tell me why I feel so low
And feel a failure though I’m trying
Filled with misery and woe
Even when my smiles are widest
I’m still haunted by despair
Although I hold fierce to hope
My doubts seem always to be there

So if it takes a word to matter
Bringing beauty so to bloom
May I cast the spells of silence
Deep within depression's tomb
May I vanquish all my demons
Which not even love can tame
As you do the rest with but your voice
Your all…even your name

I have poured my heart out.
I’ve bitten my tongue.
Neither has seen fit to set me free.
In my heart’s captivation, whether spoken or stilled,
my words do no more than imprison me.
These lyrics of love were once my salvation.
Now, they but bind me in chains they’ve once broken.
How I long for the song which remains unsung;
held captive by words that may never be spoken.

Visions refined in the darkest of dreams
Bring the cold light of day to the all I’d unsee
As the beauty long sought and fought long to protect
Still crumbles to dust in no hand but my own
For awake in this nightmare, there’s no real sleep at all
My doubts and my fears playing true to the end
My demons are real, but they come not to steal
What I give up so willingly when I lose my way
Under skies that bleed rage but wash the heart wicked
My screams fuel the fires of innocence lost

The storyline changes
Desire rearranges
‘Til the beast slain within awakens hungry for more
Beneath bridges still burning in wells buried deep
Springs the everything I thought I never would be
The souls I am reaping
And the lives I am stealing
In my eyes may be another’s
But, in truth, are my own

The corpses of my personalities lay scattered
In such disarray, much the way they had lived
No longer tormented by the hells of living
Lost in whatever hell awaits them hereafter
As the unending hunger that now consumes me
Devours even the love of beauty and beauty of love
Leaving nothing but sorrow and emptiness
Such emptiness which demands to be fed

Madness blooms within the triumphs
Which never seem to come to pass
Despite the efforts, so much remains the same
In days which seem repetitive and unchanging
Smiles become masks which feel like home
For I've become familiar with hiding myself away
Even at times when I'm most myself
Until I feel like I'm winning the war of losing my way
But, I know just what I'm fighting for
Against myself, and against the world
Despite my losses, I will rage
Through every sorrow, until my last breath
For though, at times, Fate can be so cruel
It's never so much as I am to myself
And when it seems there is nothing left to destroy
The only thing left to do is rebuild

In the future, there’s a fire
That in the present, burns within
Sometimes raging
Sometimes smoldering
Oft’ reborn to blaze again
It consumes us in such sorrow
‘Fore re-blooming us in joy
The sorrows we are facing now…
But a chapter in love’s story

Although sometimes we long for smiles of any day before
There will come a day when we'll find smiles which touch our hearts much more
So if any day, your memories refuse to let you go
Hold on, for one day happiness will be more than dreamt or known