Still Life

Soft as silk, cool as clay

We're thrown into a promise kiln

Made to break your heart of glass

Like flowers, we all wilt on a winter days

Our brittle stems get cut too soon to bloom

Ash to ash, all too soon

I heard a sad song in a grocery

Played over high school shooting, mourning shoppers

The still life of bruising fruit

Cloaked us in its sweet perfume

We were cracking ourselves up

Now my voice cracks when they mention you

I packed a lens, thought it would heal you

If you could see for yourself inside a different light

Focus on the real you

Push-pinned to walls and taped to mirrors

Meant to be revered, the image of you

Cut to

Refracted light covering pews

The messes of flown-in friends in borrowed suits

(To leave a glass half-full and a small town gutted)

I'm seeing red through all the blues

White roses bow their stems unto

The image of you

Living proof

I never said I love you, I guess I thought you knew

Ripples make the waves, make the shorelines cave

We all do

I can't say I've carried the weight in the invisible ways some do

The taller the mountain, the sweeter the view

Now I'm walking the bridge in your shoes

My demons loom

They're telling me to do it

Seduced by stunts that seem profound

But don't end the pain, they just push it around

My fingers laced the crowd

Wet-faced for birthdays spent uncrowned

Our quiet march to view

The image of you

And I never said I love you, I guess I thought you knew

Ripples make the waves, make the shorelines cave

We all do

I can't say I've carried the weight in the invisible ways some do

The taller the mountain

So, can I get a little noise made in here for my brothers?

One out from the bottle, one out from the bitter

And can I get little noise made in here for my mother?

Three boys by herself, beat hunger, carcinoma

Some noise made here for my father?

Brought his chin up, brought himself up, calls to check up Sundays still

Can we make some noise for each other?

Never fall short as long as we're reaching

Never alone if there's two hearts beating

I see no reason why any should fall

Fall victim again to a fool's call

Fall victim again

If you needed a friend

Yeah, I still get angry when I feel the void

I feel shame when I don't feel joy

So will you please make some noise?

I get embarrassed and I get choked up

When I lust for that rope up

When the fool's call lingers on my mind

Like the pool hall smoke stuck in our clothes

Sometimes my head hangs so low, I could swear that I'm in Hell

So in your wake I volunteer

Custodian to fear and sorrow

To mine unfading grief for peace

Through your ghost I see it clear

The silver lining cast along the image of you

Like shadows cast by bruising fruit

Stretched behind glass, forever viewed

Like ash survived by all our action

The framed still life of