When I lay in sheets of satin
Upon a bed of thorns
The wind howls like a woman
Cradling her baby, still born

With ****** deep in my heart
And hate smothered in my fist
The rabid rain cuts like razor blades
On the edge of a five fingered kiss

And I held the company of angels
Sorrowed by the weight of their halos
If Heaven should burn, nobody'd know
'Till the ashes blow through Desolation Row

Inside these prison walls
I made good friends with the ghosts
But good friends don't last, and sick of death
Wrapped their chains around their throats

There's a storm in the East coming quickly
I can hear Satan's stomach growl
I was told to wait here for salvation
But my soul is emaciated now

The world is the taste of steel
Lips wrapped around a revolver
Despair to dust, and no collector
All your precious prayers no longer matter

My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
I bid my faith in you farewell
So I will walk alone through the ice and the cold
Kept warm by the fires of Hell

I met a girl named Abigail
Who I spent with a couple of nights
She wore horse hair for her raincoat
And paper cuts for eyes
She was born in a manger
Beneath the donkey's bray
Then ran off with the sandman
That the inn had turned away

I met her in Nazareth
Weeping like a warring dove
Her sighs were angels dying
Her tears were Noah's flood
I never called her beautiful
I never gave her my name
For in the moment my lips had parted
My tongue had caught aflame

I became her Christmas ornament
Made of paper mache
But it'd been a cold Christmas
And she kept the cold at bay
She read the Bible to me
As I turned my blood into wine
Our idle hands locked in lust
Just sinners in our prime

She sewed me a crow
Her thumbs like Mistress Miller
But when the crow pulled out its filling
She became as tortured as a killer
The last thing about her I remember
Before that bird plucked out my sight
Was it before me with broken wings
And a crucifix cut in the dying light

When I took to my deathbed
She gave me a hymn from her harp
Her fingers moved like Lazarus
And her stories broke my heart
The notes were my gallows
The chords like a firing squad
But she waited with a smile
To deliver me to God

I pinned your poem upon my bedroom wall
I only read the words you scratched out
Because those are the only times you were honest with me
And the rest are empty shells of what you never meant to say

I got a love for blood money
And any ***** little ****
Who gives me just enough

TO put down the bottle
TO put on a new pair of jeans
TO change the sheets on the bed

God knows if she don't nothin' from me
I'm gonna give her everything I got

God knows I'm gonna be staining those sheets
And sweating it all out till my stomach turns
And my heart stops beating again

Poetry is a disease
Words sit in your gut like rotten meat
You hold onto your stomach for dear life
'Cos it's full of knives
There's no choice but to stick your pen down your throat
And bring it all up

Yeah, poets can't tie knots
And they don't own a pistol

And all that venom just stifles and stinks

But you can close the book
And close your eyes
Ready to hate yourself tomorrow

Ohio is for lovers
And I'm the jealous type
You'll be lucky
If you leave it alive

Wringing dead palms like wedding bells
No bouquet on an early grave

Winter came on December the 7th
Prayers from the penitentiary
I begged them to close the gates
Hoping that you would freeze

Ohio is for lovers
And I'm the jealous type
You'll be lucky
If you leave it alive

In and out and in and out

He talks like a dead radio
The years are skin and bone
The chalk outline beat faster
Than the blades of the helicopters

But in and out and in and out
Taking in the ****
Suffocating the starfish
No exit from this route

The twilight folk are breathing
In and out and in and out

I discovered on the spiderweb
When the noon sun kicked me out of bed
Let Winter beat back Spring
So the bees and spiders stay asleep

Nobody's gonna talk me out of this
But I wish they'd try
Push the pills into my mouth
Only waking up surprised

I'd rather be sleeping next to you
With my cracked lips painted blue
In and out and in and out
Taking in the ****
It's better not to live through this

In and out and in and out
The cradle is rocking endlessly
Till the babe inside gets dizzy
In and out and in and out

Remember when we thought we could burn the world down?
And now we can’t even manage a spark
We aren’t bored with passion or refused it
We just never knew it
And we’ve all become compliant
Being stale gasoline in gallon drums

We could be virgins or saints but we’re liars
And we wouldn’t have it any other way
Are lilac fields are wilted
And covered in swarms of honey bees
And we walk hand in hand through the hives
And come out swinging

Putting our trust into mapmakers who’ve never seen the world
Their limbs have all been broken
Now treading water with their hearts
This could be the most meaningful turn of the world
And you’d never ever know it
Until it came like a tidal wave crashing through your front door

We’ve been screaming at the sky until our throats are raw
And all we hear back is silence, not even an echo
I swear to God I haven’t felt like myself in so long
‘Cos all that’s left of me is confusion
We’re all mad here in this wasteland
With our dead cowboys and our dead spacemen

Forever Peter Pan in a business suit
Forever Peter Pan when my spine has doubled over
Forever Peter Pan on a morphine drip
And forever Peter Pan in a casket
And all that’s left of a name
Is what’s chiseled on your gravestone