Cold glow

I sleep in the cold glow
Of the television
As I dream of everyone
Being better off than me
A familiar TV show
Plays on forever
This is how
I make things a little bit better

More to life

Muddy trousers
And a log in your maths book
After each game
Everyone had a look
“I’ve scored 15”
“I’ve scored 20”
“And what about me?
“I’ve scored plenty”

One of those same kids
Died a few years ago
And two of those boys
Are dealing on the down low
And if there’s more to life
Than football
Then I don’t want to hear about it
And if there’s more to life
Than football
Then I don’t want to know about it

My best friend’s dad
Coached us for years
Through heart-breaking losses
And celebratory beers
Nowadays,
Nobody’s around here
And I’m stuck in misery
Drowning in fear

I guess there’s more to life
Than football
But I find that
It’s not so nice
I wish that it were simpler
But I can’t stop
The changing of the
Tides

I Felt a Funeral in my Brain

My brain hasn’t quite been there
Since sometime around August
And ever since then I can’t get myself straight
My friend, he’s been drinking
I don’t think he’s ever stopping
I really think this race to the bottom
Should wait

And October rolls around
And I can’t get up off the ground
My mind is shrinking
Reductive thinking
Nothing else can occupy my time
And in my delirium
I spit out words that seldom rhyme
But I am a grown up
I should grow up
Figure all of this dumb shit out
Instead focusing on photo-negatives
And living inside doubt

And it’s December
A long December
I feel a funeral in my brain
And I can’t remember
I can’t remember
Anything that I was saying
And my friend’s drinking
He kept drinking
Worked himself into a state
And all I did was sit and think
Think about what I should say

I am a grown up
I should grow up
Or let it all just piss away
By binging Bob’s Burgers
And sleeping in all day
But there was a funeral
A definite funeral
I had it on replay
Another young man’s dead
It’s always been the same
I’ll tell you he mattered
They all mattered
I won’t say the same for me
I am as inconsequential
As a dead leaf on the breeze
And that’s just a feeling
It’s how I’ve been feeling
I know that they’re not always true
But when it’s at your door
And in your head
What the hell can you do?

Washed into Grey

Sometimes I think
I’ve changed a lot
From who I was
15 and lost
But more often
Than not
I feel that
I’m the same

Still afraid
Of uncertainty
Unsure of you
Unsure of me
And I don’t know
If I know
Who I really
Am

What’s changed
Is the hope
That I’ll ever
Figure this shit out
Weighed down
All the time
By worry
And persistent
Doubt

Since consciousness formed
My outlook
Has been bleak
A bad year
A bad month
That was supposed
To be a week

And everyone says
It gets easier
With the passing of time
But as far as I
Can tell
I am just quietly dying
And the angst doesn’t die
You just internalise it
And they drain you
Of blood
Prick
By prick

Counting Crows

I wanted to write you something
I wanted to just say something
And I wanted you to know

I am overflowing
A river that’s burst its banks
Anaemic blood
That leaks from a vein.
Knocked by a light wind blowing
Frozen by the first sign of snowing
I am counting crows
And lowest lows

Collarbone

I want to leave
Little indentations
On the skin
That glides over
Your collarbone

Meet me by

I was in Holland
Surrounded by strangers
Imagining tulips
And your favourite hydrangeas
And I thought about you
At the water’s edge
I always think about you
At the water’s edge
And wishing to be
Wherever you will be

And then I wouldn’t think of you
For weeks at a time
Until I hit the water’s edge
And wished you were mine

The Hum Goes on Forever

I’m beginning to think
That the hum goes on forever
The echo of their eyes
Sits inside of you
And can never be
Taken away

A holding pattern of defeat

Vomit spattered on the floor
Like a Jackson Pollock
This is what I get
For being such a bollocks
My late twenties’
Twilight fades
As I get off the floor
Where I should have remained

Late night lads
And cheap white wine
He has tears in his eyes
Says he’s feeling fine
Marijuana and after-eights
There’s nothing about this
That I don’t hate

I was friendly to a dickhead
I was asleep before I hit the bed
Took off my pants
Took off my jacket
Holy fuck
I don’t know if I can hack it

The sweet taste of your lips
The elegant way you sway your hips
I close my eyes
And I see you
Sometimes it’s all
That I can do

If I was Atlantis and you were the sea

The towels hang from the radiators
In the shape of two crows.
I’m humming “if I was Atlantis and you were the sea”
And I am left thinking that this isn’t where we should be

The blue standby light stares me down
Unblinking, unrelenting, unmoved by crows
And I just want to know, what it is that you see
Whenever you look upon me