You've ruined smiles for me
Twisted them, beyond definition
Curves of lips ***** up my spine
Ghosting the air over my arms
Like an arctic breeze
Whispered air of whispers
Which curses the smiles
That I follow following me
Simpering smiles and snide smiles
Curtains over gritted teeth
And the false niceties that are
The fastest path to achieving what they want
Not what they need, they don't need smiles
Nobody needs the smiles anymore
Don't smile, unless you wish
To be mistrusted by the many
I cannot smile in the street
The price, a sneer or slap
So I cast my eyes down to the cobbles
And watch the rain wash away
The years' and years' worth of salt
Don't smile at me, please
It makes my throat sting

I do love you, daddy
And you break my heart
When you stand at the door
All dejected and half-smiling
When she says she's already
Got a lot of clothes to wash
So yours won't make it onto the pile
And then you nod, with a quiet
"Goodbye," and you slip out of the house
Away into the clear morning
To miss us again for another day
And I want to cry into my mug
When you've left and all that's in your wake
Is the spinning washing machine
Full of our clothes and none of yours

I suppose the happy are dead
The broken are unliving
I rest in graveyards, under clouds
Watching the world spin
Twist fingers through the waving grass
That grows around the graves
Ivy weaving over crumbling stones
Letters faded and worn now
But still a stone, standing
Holding up the ceiling of grief
For the body locked beneath
They're happy places, graveyards
Resting grounds for noticed souls
Cherished in life and loved in death

I want to know if angels cry
When they see what we're doing
Down here from the sky
I wonder if they watch us
As we wreck this world
Wreck all these places and people
Spinning little hurricanes
All caught up in our own eyes
Centred around what we can see
There's little room for any others

Or their own catastrophes
We live and work around ourselves
Self-preservation is what we
Never seemed to manage to lose
We always needed it, didn't we
Because of the dark alleys and back roads
The grimier corners that made us look twice
Over our shoulders and tighten our hands
Around the weight of the world on our shoulders
Because we didn't trust anybody else to hold it up

I used to think it was awful to be
Someone who spun around themselves
But I think I'm starting to find
That maybe, it's better to bind
Yourself to yourself, and keep arms wrapped around
Push up away from the hardened ground
I wonder if the angels see
Every tiny smile shared between the few
Who stopped to try and enjoy the view
Of a broken world full of people who want to fix it.

Your hands are filthy, trailing grime
Dragged through loveless gutters
They don't belong on this shrine
Or grabbing at the shutters
That bind together the pieces
Of my broken love for self
I've been trying to iron out creases
But I really don't want your help
Has anyone ever looked at you
And told you the very thing
(You've never heard the truth)
No, so I will: "you're disgusting"
And no, not by your definitions
You've got no **** to be small
Or fluttering waist; a malnutrition
No, it's just you, you in all
A worthless, trailing, entitled brat
Nobody ever told you "no"
At least, you didn't hear that
You heard 'teases' and "I don't wanna go slow"
Some blame systems, I blame
The ones who gave you this name
Who put the very thoughts inside your brain
And slid you into the picture frame
Where I am an object, for you to unwrap
And tear to ribbons when you can't undo
The masking tape keeping me trapped
And when you're finished, when you're through
I'll join the others, tossed aside
Because you can't be bothered to understand
The truth that, to you, has been cried
"We're not pawns on your checkered lands."

Who told you
That you had
To want me?

We are the two halves the universe has given
Multiple intertwining pieces to make up one shell
To house this pearl that we hold between each breath
A shimmering, gleaming beauty, heart between those two cages
Of ribs and lungs, lungs full of my breath and your breath
Breathe in, breathe out, through my lips and out of yours
Intoxicatingly acidic, this drunken mist seeping under our skin
Silvery and silent, twisting and turning along those veins
That you trace with fleeting fingers along my wrists
And poisoning my eyes in the most beautiful sort of way
You see, my darling, they only wish to look at you
No other can compare to the moonlit pulse that you provide
Those notes that climb from your mouth and spill from my lips
We are two beings, into one person, two mouths moulding
Into one trail of sparks that they can follow, but never find
For we are beyond this place, we are rising and falling
To the beat of galaxies, simultaneously falling apart and reforming
Beneath closed eyelids covering eyes of burning flames
With that void of defiant nothing, dead centre
Inside that ring of molten flesh and blood

Your lips taste of ash, ashes of the bodies you leeched before
A now-silent battleground of dying beauties, losing in love
Eyes open and leaking those tears of ice that we knew too soon
Trailing salt and tearing apart soft skin to make way
For bleached bones, stripped of smooth flesh and waking lungs
The sky was far too dark to frame you, my dear, as you looked
Upon the fruits of your desires, the prizes of your games
Those twisted, strangled bodies, all askew and leaking grief
They all heaved in their dying breaths, and all reached
Those rotting, dripping arms towards your unmarked back
As you turned and you walked from them, those pitiful souls
But you and I are different, to them and you, you and them
We are different to the mutilated faces, massacred bodies
We are different to the burning tears and the ashes
Because, it's you and me, these bodies that can be along together
Share in those priceless moments that span a lifetime
How could we be the same as those bodies?
Wake up, look at me, tell me with those ashen lips
Tell me that we're different, tell me that we're different
But you can't, can you? Look me in the eyes and tell me you love me
And I'll know that you want my breath for yourself

I need you to stop
Please
Stop
I need you to step away
Backwards
Let yourself see the entire screen
Of programmed chaos before you
All separated, eternally separated
By that layer of glass that cannot shatter
Unless you want it to
But would you ever want it to?
No, no, of course not
That would be far, far too M E S S Y

I need you to be quiet
Please, just for a moment
Or a while, or a little longer
It's all up to you
Everything's in your hands
All the wire-ends and spark plugs
The human race coughed up
What would you like to do with them?
Just please, please
Don't make any more M E S S  

You've been staring at that spot
For hours, hours on end
Don't your eyes hurt yet?
Haven't they crossed
Out of focus?
How can you bear to stare
For so long
At so little?
Why don't you, can't you
Just step backwards
Because there's an entire picture here
A whole image, crystal
In ****** colours, splattered
For you to see in whole
But do you want to?
I confess,
We've made a bit of a M E S S

I need to
Scream
Until my lungs
Rip apart
And I ***** them
From my lips
Dripping blood
Like rubies
And my throat tears
Like shredded sandpaper
It won't be beautiful
Or tragic
Or wondrous
It will be disgusting
And horrific
And you won't want
To look

I need to
Scream
And you
Can't listen
But I need you to
Hear

there's a stupor in your eyes
and it's lightened by ease
a swirling mist of disconnect
softened by prosthetic drugs

there's a sun coming up
over the horizon
but next to you
it looks more like
a star

I wish I could suspend this single moment
And let it span a lifetime in a minute  
Here, where the light glows softly
And tints the walls and my skin gold
While it shines through my nails
Painting everything over in a peaceful trance
This is the place of slumbering souls
And my breath is the ticking of a worldly clock
The only one I can ever trust
Here, I am quiet, and here, I can breathe

I wish I could play this song again
Over and over a hundred thousand times
Because for once it's not a lie
Or a fabrication inside of my hopeful mind
Stitched from a thread of disbelief
For once, it's real and it's here
And I can breathe inside this vision
Even though those breaths are stolen
And my lungs are guilty
I can breathe here, even if only for a moment

I wish the quiet could last forever
The shifting silence punctured by chords
And shifting of fingertips on bedsheets
I am alone here but I am free
Finally I can touch these walls
Finally I can trace the photos of another life
With gentle hands that wish to smash
To break, to destroy, to rip and tear
But they never do, never in this moment
In this moment they still

I wish that I didn't have to sleep
For when I wake it will not be like this
When my eyes open I will have been thrown again
Back into the clockwork cogs of the real world
Pushed into place in a steel roundabout
Eternally spinning and throwing and chewing
Past everything in its path
But here, my fingers twirl through the air
Tracing patterns of dreams and stars and collisions
Between planets and worlds and lips

I wish that I didn't have to wake up
Because if this is so beautiful here
In the space where I can breathe
Then it will be twice as lovely
In the place of translucent dreams
Where it can suspend across a lifetime
Where I can play the song again
Where the quiet will last forever
Where I will not have to sleep
Because I will be dancing beyond this place

Flowers grow through cracks
Cracks in the wall
Where bare brick has been torn apart by bare storms
Or steel ripped apart by a hurricane of grief
Cracks in the pavement
Where some people refuse to step
In the fear of some supernatural supernova
Descending from the heavens and ripping their mind apart
Cracks grow in places where there is nobody to keep them from becoming brittle
Things snap when they're left for too long
Like sticks and bodies and minds
That have had enough of casual use
Of beatings and bricks and careful abuse

Pain is beautiful
Is that what they told you?
Be proud of those wounds and gashes you painted
Show them to the world because your pain is beautiful
Did it feel beautiful?
When it was four in the morning and you were staring at your ceiling
Wondering how everything had spiralled in iridescent lines
What a beautiful thing it is, to fall
To fall from that crumbling platform you built for yourself
How lovely it was when your fingernails ripped
As you scrambled and clutched at the edge
And your stomach wracked from your mouth as you fell
Did it feel beautiful, when you fell?
Did you ever really fall?

Everything ugly can become beautiful
A thousand poppies above a sea of rotting corpses
Turning to a graveyard of bones
Flower heads red like the blood spilt on the dark soil
Drip, drip, drip like a broken tap
Slash, slash, slash like a knife slicing through flesh
And that muffled, drawn-out scream mixed with gurgling of blood
Bubbling from lips and staining them, staining everything
That garish, bright shade of crimson
And then a thump
Because the end is always the softest part
Even if you cling on, kicking and screaming
The tide will sweep you away and your voice will not be heard
Unless you can find a rock out in the waves
And tear off those fingernails all over again to just
Hold on

Flowers grow through cracks
Cracks in bones and cracks in minds
Flowers of that garish, bright shade of crimson
With those seeds of madness
That wind you up like a little music box
And twist you around like a clockwork ballerina
And when you break those tiny screws
It's all your fault
The flowers that grow through the cracks
Are the flowers that drive the nail further
Until it hits soft flesh
Down through to bone
The bone of cracks and broken screws
But you did it all yourself
Why did you do this to yourself?

I want to shred my skin to slivers
Then stick it all back onto these hollow bones
With cheap glue and melted-down insides
A beautifully macabre papered design
To set into motion that deep, dull ache
That goes beyond skin and blood and flesh
That settles into the very marrow of my bones
Like a dreary numbing blow
I'll recreate it all, my own Picasso
Lips stuck inside out, limbs all a-bundled
Maybe I can stop myself
From being able to turn others inside-out
Hang myself in pieces from the bedroom curtains
The white stained with red paint and sweat
I can create to decreate, build to destroy
Pile up all these hollow bricks to build
A house I'll flick over with a single scream

I'm a ******* supernova of stars
Exploding and hurtling in bright expanses
Of sparks and stars and spiralling suffering
Throwing myself into space like a stray flame flicker
To destroy the empty space
Where everybody is safe from me, where they cannot see
What I have become
Planets are simply specks of glitter on my peripheral vision
And I engulf them in the inferno
Cities burn, castles crumble, while the councils cry out
But still I burnt through, still I burn
Until they're returned to the ground they came from
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust
Man born of earth must one day return
To their graves of lies and spite
With headstones to lock them in at night

I'm a fish out of air
Gasping for the poison I've become
Limbs flailing as chest heaves upwards
Begging for merciful surrender
I can feel each crack making its way up my skin
Brittle arms shaking under the weight of my tries
Purple mist seeps into my eyes
Pushing back the droplets of humanity
And pulling out the method of insanity
Flailing underneath these invisible hands
While bedsheets trap me six feet under
How boring it was, that yearning strike
How typical, that childish wonder
As to whether the stars were the eyes of gods
And pondering as to how our world would die
I never used to want to know
How it felt to fall

I'm dying to live like a falling star
Sliding behind the wavering horizon
To find a land where mornings are guided by sparks
Falling endlessly in irresistible lurch
Without scrambling for purchase on the splintering ledge
I'm going to spin and scream and sprain
Every arm and palm and heart
That falls into my path
A destructive lullaby of lilies
Arranged around a tombstone
In the shape of a perfectly pretty pillar
That holds up the weight of heaven
I'll catch every whisper and whimper and wish
And tear it to pieces like a paper moon
Set the pieces back to the wind
To find their ruined authors
And taunt them yet again

Rose coloured skies to cover the grime oozing over the surface
As yellow paint slicks onto the sea of black tar
A weak barrier against the smog
The trees line the golden ring
The sun has bound around the earth
Until the city skyline glows that irrefutable shade of orange
That chases away the moonlight and the birds and the roses
Leaving behind an outline of skeletal mustiness and misery
A graveyard of ashes rising above
The grey fermented pavement, a canvas of footsteps and broken pieces
Ashes on streets, ashes in lungs
Ashes inside and around and above and below
Death lingers over the cinderblock garden
These buildings are gravestones, the streets run with grey
The cremation of love and lips and lies
This place is a dying forest of falling branches
As a body slumps and falls, another rises through
To push above the skyline of bones
And become part of that rosy heaven above

Every footfall draws another drop of sweat
While each rise of a chest leaves blood running
Down cheeks like the tears of statues
The people don't talk, the birds choke on their melodies
Notes like worms as they force themselves up throats
Puked like stringed sentences of lies and misfortune
Splattering the tarmac like injustice on heartstrings
That have hardened to rods of steel
Indifferent to acidic tears and rose petals
The dust flies like spit
In clouds through the alleyways
Clinging and stinging eyes, ******* shut
Drying loose tongues and filling open mouths
'Till they choke and they have to speak around
Every word they ever wished to speak
You have no safe breaths under this sky
There are no safe words you can ever say
Under the falling roses

You've become a statue
Your eyes don't cry as they used to
This place has changed you, has warped your mind
These streets of everlasting dust
They've stripped you down and built you back
With crumbling bones and brittle skin
And muscles that have been pulled taught
Your face is sallow plastic
Moulded by those you swore to hate
You've become their toy, you're their little project
To twist and try and test
The streets melt beneath your feet
Pavement rippling and scorching
It's poisoning you, toxic and tasteless
These streets of never ending lust
For blood, for bone, for a brittle crown
Of a falling castle, a burning council
The roses are falling rotten
Petals upon the darkening road
The roses are falling rotten
The roses falling from the dust-filled sky