What is this shape upon my screen, away beneath the glass?
It moves and makes itself unseen, and stays behind the back.
It will not meet for words to hold, or rest in any riff,
I can not see for all my soul, or guess for all you’d give.

That face that people fear when seeing colours in the air,
The shapes we see and sounds we hear of others and their cares.
That shadow we create when giving all the ghosts a guise,
The blinding bellow we can make when living silent lives.

Where are those scenes I sat and saw, where are the words I want?
I’ve empty leaves and nothing more, and don’t deserve my salt.
What is this mind of countering the epics of the screen,
With hollow finds and bantering and echoes of a dream.

Where are those scripts I lived and loved, and those that just sprang forth?
They never lift into a form of ink enough to talk.
They are unmade and go on masked into hindsightful days,
As I just age, and look to last, and know the light’ll fade.

All those laughs and legends that ran long into the nights,
All the past and present, but a shadow in the light.
All those years I’ve let go by, those reams of sighted stage,
All smoke an’ soot an’ steam an’ sky, and tears on a page.

What is this mind attached to me? It seems to live itself,
While I am stuck it knows it’s free, while poor it swims in wealth.
What is this fire I never lit? It grows while I dissolve,
I’m just for hire – to service it. I’m just an earthly home.

The knowledge phantoms keep, with all their channels of control,
That rummaging and reaping through the shallows of my soul.
That thrusting in their trail, all the sparks a man can see,
Sinking deep into a smile neither knowing nor asleep.

Why are the gems of Hollywood a wish that never came?
Because we tend the sorry shoulds an’ I don’t take the aim.
Why are the plots and persons but a memory worn away?
Because the lost in purpose is the one to waste a day.

The word has never led the will, the schooled not feathered from the quill.
From small of men to all heights, he calls on them and brings the light.
From in that black that joins the sparks, to feats of fact that leave me lost.
From one so filled with a vacant head, to an over-killed that joined the dead.

A token of the tanglin’ waitin’ in the web you watch,
Is the moment where your hands in and you’re wonderin’ if it’s hot,
A headline for your home place, it’s a banner for the brain,
There’s a deadline on the dope mate, ‘less the stammer go insane.

A step of soul, or swim ashore, I left the boat and lost the oars.
A stepping stone, an open door. From all I know to all and more.
A mighty feat. A single orb. A slight of sleep or beam aboard.
From one idea to total things, come walk the wire without the strings.

An accident? Or course to be? This insolent thought he was free.
From being awful, being dammed. To being an orphan of his land.