It’s been two decades and I’m still sweating out this fever

My eyes haven’t stopped watering since my family tree fell over,
branch by branch we collapsed into the river,
rushing faster and faster to mutually assured destruction,
no one is getting out alive here

No one is getting out alive here in this world,
so we might as well get it while the going is going because one day the going is going to stop and we’ll be left holding on to as much as we can,
We’ll feel so sorry for ourselves then

I’ve walked with snakes on my shoulders for as long as I can remember,
All my hearing has amounted to hisses,
and all of my bones have broken to bend and expand to hold all of the feelings I’ve eaten

Made love with the ****** and prayed to every angel I’ve seen in my paralysis,
In my dreams I see flowers,
Red like blood,
but clean like a mended heart,
Slowly but surely I’ll likely tear myself apart

But I like it like this,
It gives me a reason to wonder,
and wander,
So I’ll continue to wonder,
and wander

We all just drink to get drunk,
We’re all just ghosts without a house to haunt,
I’ve been feeling this sickness creep up into my throat,
and it’s been drying to get out, and I think I’ll let it

I’m still learning what falling in love feels like,
Still coming to grips with realities that don’t involve bruised eyelids and unforgivable I told you so’s,
Sometimes it feels like I’m coming to the end of my rope but then it frays all over again and I’m stuck trying to wind it back up,
How selfish to think I can fix something that’s too broken

Cut to my grandmother getting dolled up for her closeup because the church taught her how to become her own messiah, now she doesn’t know how to love the right way,
I’m starting to think that none of us do

I’m starting to run with the wolves,
The moon speaks in tongues to me,
I keep asking her to take me back where I belong,
Every painting hanging in my room is blank,
Blank and powerful,
but afraid,
I’m starting to think we all are

I’ve been sweating everything out,
It’s taking longer than I want it to

I just hope that by the time I’m laying on my deathbed,
I’ll be as dry as this all bled me