Oh such lonesome lives in the west
When the sunshine stings bleary eyes
and telephones receive no calls
How does one survive in the city
When the angular buildings suppress creativity
and free-thought is despicable

See the man, laying in bed for days at a time
With ASMR videos playing on a smartphone propped against a pillow
and his arm draped over that pillow, imagining a body
Bob Ross love affair, the television drones
Each night spent alone, praying for passion, or acceptance, or anything
and joyous noise when paintbrushes glide evenly

A collective of poets, posing as one man
Fraudulent minds, each with distinctive style
and all with crooked broken teeth
Trumpets in the jukebox, cat-calls in the world
Outside the window children are playing
and he cries, for the years are growing weary

She peels skin from her fingernails, mindless on morning commutes
He stares from bus stops, train stations and runways
and never blinking, never blinking, never blinking
The intrinsic value of repetition falling short of artistry
Given that metal machines are perpetual
and when the crow lands on fences in the morning dew,
there is no more life in Ironville, not for me, not for you