It was simple at first
I did it on a dare
There's a certain easiness
to difficult dares
when senses are dulled
by alcohol and fame
show me how
that color tastes
It was like
biting into the sun
it burned my tongue
and nothing else
would ever taste the same
or be the same
it calmed the storm
of daddy leaving
it was as if my
new found Catholicism
was a purgatory from where
I could see the bright white
pearly gates of heaven
and feel the chill
of their snow clad bars
colder than
the coldest winter chill
one night in a dream
my father told me
to meet him at the gates
and from that point
I went every night
but he never came
instead he died
and when he died
my dreams died
with him.
bury me softly
in this tomb
I continued to go there
night after night
I desperately wanted
to believe the gates
would lead to heaven
because in hell there's heat
and this place was cold
so cold with no sound
and no light only darkness
I would sit in the cold
for hours, losing all sense
of time, obligations
responsibilities, shivering
and sweating at the foot of
the gates, obsessed with the
furry luster of frozen pearls
the sound of silence and
the subtle shifting of
the weather
holding rare
flowers in bloom
a week, a month
a year would pass
the snow began to slip
in clumps and tumble
to the ground again
and again and again
and then
all hell broke loose
the heat was hot
the gates were gone
and I began to run
but
every path
led me to nowhere
the blue cold went red hot
and then turned black
I tried to leave that place
13 times I left and
13 times returned
there was nowhere else to go
no place to call home
I burned within my sick head
I wanted to peel
the skin from my face
so hot
I was bleeding for you
soaked in sweat
my calloused heart
would not ask for help
serenity
was far away
my hands were bruised
from breaking rocks all day
far from the chill
I couldn't remember
anymore anyway
so desperate
for a glimpse of snow
it all came down
to this
I could not live apart
from that place
and I could not live
within it
so tonight
I will marry the two
the here and the now with
the there and the then
mix the snow with the fire
mix the snow add the fire
mix snow with fire
mix snow add fire
snowfire
snowfire
snowfire
momma
I am burning
momma I am cold
mother please save me
don't leave me alone
I see you but
you've come too late
can you hold me anyway?
whisper in my ear
I'm so sorry mother
I haven't bathed in 2 weeks
momma come hold me please
I'm down in a hole mother
feeling so low mother
I'm so cold mother
come save me
take me home
mother
I am dying
mommy
I am dead
sit with me
in silence
sit with me
I am dead
mommy I'm scared
black is all I feel
so this must be how it feels
to be free
mother
I am dead
In Memory of Layne Stayley
born August 22, 1967 died April 5, 2002
Re-Dedicated today on what would have been his 50th Birthday..
