Old habits stick
Like I'm covered in glue
It makes me sick
I can't get them off
No matter what I do

They stain my hands
Stick to my skin
They're outside of me
And within

I try to peel
To scrub and change
But healing and growth
Still feels strange

Highways go on forever
intertwining suburban homes;
where boys are loved into men;
then drive away

She was just seven,
She really wanted to go to heaven,
Dreamed of being free,
Loved the idea of there being a "we".
They told her what she can’t wear,
They told her she has to put up her hair.

She was just thirteen,
Staring at glowing screen.
They told her she’ll distract the boys,
They told her she doesn’t have a choice,
At the time she didn’t realise she didn’t have a voice.

She was just fifteen,
Haunted by all the things she’d heard and seen.
Haunted by all of her thoughts,
She just didn’t yet know how to connect the dots.
And they just told her that he was being mean,
They told her that she was the one making a scene.

Now she’s twenty one,
Realised that freedom isn’t always that much fun.
She found out the game’s not fair,
They’ll always paint her with despair.
And that might be okay,
She can always just call it a day.
This caused her to believe,
That there are a lot of things she can achieve.

But she will never win,
They will always say she committed a sin.
She is doing well,
doesn’t care what the whispers tell,
even if she’ll go to hell.
Because that’s the one place they said wasn’t cool,
So maybe she’s the fool,
And heaven is the place that’s not cool.

If she knows that they’re dumb,
Why is she so numb?
She doesn’t know how to feel,
Is all of this even real?

I think I'm growing up,
I don't need the same things a child does,

But I need love,
I need your love.

You give me air to breathe,
Warm arms to melt into,

You give me a reason to be,
Let's keep being.

For to rest in the gymnasium
Is to watch others wrestle.
There is no pendulum
Which is not but itself a pebble.

I am the gnomon.

For all are free
And each person is their own mason.
From the block of marble we chisel
Out who are ourselves.

Fission, fusion.
Derision after derision.
Creation, destruction.
Degredation after degredation.
Combination, seperation.
Decay after decay.

Fusion, fission.
Praise after praise.
Destruction, creation.
Amelioration after amelioration.
Splitting, collaboration.
Growth after growth.

I know only
That I know nothing!