1. |
Can't Be One
03:11
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Tell me what you need
Say the word and I’ll be there
All of me is ours to share
Spill your guts and I’ll clean up
So much to say I had to leave
I saw the confluence downstream
Wanted to sit you in a
room uninhibited for days
Lost in your thoughts but I walked away
I knew we’d keep pushing into each other
Until we’re caught on fire
And we can’t be one
there will always be a space
We can’t be in the same place
We can never be one
So we’ll leave as we came
Apart and unchanged
Remnants of being obsessed
Your name in my predictive text
I don’t think less of you but I wish I could have thought of you less
And it’s nothing you said
it’s what you could that got to me
I saw the confluence downstream
If I can’t sit you in a room closing in on us
Until we overlap but the atoms don’t touch
So close we can almost repel each other
Finally we catch on fire
We can’t be one
there will always be a space
We can’t occupy the same place
We can never be one
It can only go so far
Till we remember who we are
We remember that we’re flawed
It’s repeating like an old CD
I see too much of you in me
Bouncing ideas off a mirror the answers won’t come
we can’t be one
Something needs fixing
we were clipping
You could punch me in the shoulder, and you’d phase through
Anything would have made us undone
I never made sure that it was safe when it was deep
I would have followed you downstream
We can’t be one
there will always be a space
We can’t occupy the same place
We can never be one
So we’ll leave as we came
Apart, unchanged
It’s repeating like an Old CD
In you I’ve seen too much of me
It’s repeating like an Old CD
I see too much of you in me
It’s repeating like an Old CD
If it’s killing you then it’s killing me
It’s repeating like an Old CD
You said it’s killing you and that’s killing me
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2. |
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I’m better off unattached
I know you’re better off untied
You had your reasons, I didn’t need them
And it’s better I don’t wonder why
Walking on tightropes
With harnesses and safety nets
Doesn't matter; it still broke
Can't say when or if you fell into old patterns
When I did I should have been the first to know
It wasn’t okay
I know I put too much on you for me to stay
Even when I was relieved I didn’t fuck up and lose you every day
With no good reason to be that way
But it’ll be okay
Guards down, filters lowered maybe by then we were just tired
It was so hot out the couch became a funeral pyre
Head on your shoulder, over and over, I should have changed my wiring
But any action that we did would burn the other in the fire
I keep trying to take the right things from what happened in those hours
Was it somebody’s brain chemistry, was it just as much a lack of ours?
I looked at you, you looked at your phone I didn’t know how
I ever thought I would always stick around
It wasn’t okay
I tried to reach out, I know I’m wrong when I speculate
I don’t blame you at all I know I was a lot to take
For what I needed, and what I wanted without thinking all the way
And it’ll be okay
But it wasn’t okay
I’m sorry I asked so much of you then hoped you'd stay
Among more unspoken mistakes
I curse myself I curse my hands I curse my lack of restraint
Even when everything’s okay
If I took you at your word it would make sense why you would go
With all that you were going through, it’s best I didn’t follow
Not hard to wonder why you never let me look at you in awe
But when we got up close, why was the distance all I saw?
The more I knew the less I wanted to be you or yours
And when I said I needed space, wasn’t surprised you needed more
And I know I mattered to you but I still can’t shake the dissonance
My projection, your self-protection shifting us toward ambivalence
Either way
I know now like you did that I couldn’t stay
Pulling triggers, firing blanks,
Never a war but who would want to wait
Even blanks can kill in close enough range
So it’ll be okay
I can’t speak for you but I know that if we stayed
I’d be exhausted as you were by the end of that day
Lock myself into your orbit for all you gave, I would still say, you’re 30 million miles away
(There is a void I’ll fill alone
I’ll feel alone I’ll feel alone
There is a void but I know
You’re not alone and I’m not alone)
(The more I’m afraid to lose you the more I should and the more I will
I’m grateful you spared me you could have gone in for the kill)
(Fired away,
Your trust fades
There’s nothing more I need from you, or you want to say to me
I curse myself my hands and arms
Did I ease the pain or add to the harm
I accept if the answer’s in between)
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3. |
Doppelgängers
05:19
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We built a bridge
So we could always be connected
Joining all our thoughts and senses
Wander between and never leave
A state of bliss
We’d switch accounts and share our passwords
We could turn into each other
Total access was all we’d need
And maybe I could see your reflection in the mirror
Find safety in the way I dissolved and disappeared
I look for you in everyone
When I find you I run
When I find you I run
I look for you in everyone
When I find you I run
When I find you I run
Late nights we hid
I looked at your eyes you looked at mine
In silence most of the time
The only place I where I could breathe
Don’t let them in
We’ll switch to texts when they’re in the room
They wouldn’t get what we’re up to
It’s those moments I still grieve
I look for it in everyone
Til I find it and run
Til I find it and run
every day structured around you
I'd do anything to keep you
I’d take the blame
For everything that you did wrong
I could be everything you want
So I could hide out in your body
I’d forget my shame
I’d have questions, you’d answer them
Why did I ask and ask again?
I told the truth, at least you believed me
What would I say, what would you do
if I ever let you,
if you left me or if I ever left you?
I look for you in everyone
Even when I should run
Even when I should run
Yeah why would I get out
Who would hear and still want me around
Nothing I could talk about
In my head and on the screen but nowhere to be found
You cut the nerves
The way I processed didn’t help
Staying close made me hate myself
All the wrong lessons received
I said you deserved
Everything I had and more
Isn’t that what I asked for
To be at a stranger’s mercy?
every day structured around you
Anything to keep you
every day structured around you
Anything to keep you
The jokes we escalated
You said you never hated it
Still the only one who never felt I was too much
What I try to recreate
And don’t know til it’s too late
There must be other ways to love
I probably should hate you
But I looked through your messages too
I’ve forgiven us, it wasn’t our faults
But I still miss the feeling, I still want to dissolve
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4. |
Sculpture
04:50
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Sculpture
There were reasons to tie myself to someone else
But I didn’t want to merge I just wanted to be heard
There were reasons to go off script and off the cliff
But to freeze frame mid flight, ignore the part where they crashed and died
Comorbidities aside, on my own I couldn’t survive
Emotionally destitute, I couldn’t live right so I lived through
I would soak it all up, I thought that would make me loved
All I retained was secondhand pain
I came back as a block of marble
Hammered into a sculpture by him and them and her and her
Without a blueprint, with their own shit
Patient and undeterred
So am I your friend?
You’ll say you’re proud like I’m your project
I’ll accept if the answer’s in between
I couldn’t keep you out of harm's way with a serious face
I just spoke as if I was prepping you to step in my place
Because you spoke like you don't break, you get burned, it leaves no trace
Maybe that's why I thought you’d take it when I’d take
And maybe I should not have told you the misguided things I’ve done
No charm offensives, no detonating lethal affection
I don’t know why I worked so hard all the time to be let in
As if I only improved to impress them
Maybe the books were right
That I couldn’t change and couldn’t grow
And if I did, what did you know?
Ah ah ah
Ah ah ah
I couldn’t trust myself to understand others so I became practical
In return I could learn how to be less of a wreck
As if everything’s a little bit transactional
One day bending towards mutual respect
But now at least the worst of it is starting to wither
Every stranger I fell into is fading from view
No more spinning out to whirlpools, no more flowing into rivers
There must be lessons from this mess to hold on to
All the ways that they’re open
Like they’re giving me permission
Ah ah ah
To speak forever
As if they wanted to listen
Ah ah ah
I relearn how to act
Relearn to set a limit
Ah ah ah
Do better for myself
And not to be forgiven
There was a joke I made
in my notes the other day
that I’m sure you’d find funny
but I keep it to myself
I’ll find some distance between
What I am and what you’ve seen
Somehow in that gap I’ll figure out what I’ve felt
I wish it came more naturally
To build walls and speak more carefully
But I’m fighting myself off until it’s back to all the books
about setting and respecting boundaries
now at least the worst of me is starting to wither
Every stranger I fell into is fading from view
I always said I’m proud too loud, condescension made you bitter
Was there a way it could still mean something to you?
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5. |
Hotel Room
05:04
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Did you forget who’s a stranger?
They warned about it in fables
To be free, to be one
Drawn by anybody’s sound
But cut it out
You’re swept away when they burst
You caused the flood, you get submerged
This is why you’re called too much
Why you have to turn around
you let them down
You let them down
If you don’t turn around
You’ll let them down
Put out the flames regain control
Evaporating the black hole
Don’t let yourself go say much more
Never go get so absorbed
Stay right there outside arm's length
Find the time and find the strength
Put it out of your mind
If it’s not too late to try
No lines with people like us
It’s not love and it’s not trust
But the sirens crowd your thoughts
The flashing lights always glow
You have to go
If walls were there, then they broke
Hands to yourself, or you’ll choke
You overwrote an overwrought
apology, it’s overblown
Damage control
Give up control
You should have stayed gone when you left
When you learned that you’re a mess
Everything afraid of you
And you keep hiding yourself too
Don’t try to be all someone needs
What could you give them? you haven’t found it yourself
You’ll wish you could take it back say, “you can count on me”
All to lose your sanity, to strip away your boundaries
You’ll find no closure no clarity
In losing yourself completely
You get close and it goes cold
Or you’re already bound to blur
Save your words
Did you trick into trust
There are more ways to love
Than scouting out places to dump
Until everyone has heard
Save your words
I’ll save my words
It still floats around your head
Takes too much to lay to rest
You’ll love the way they cross a line
It takes too much so let it die
You know you can’t be all someone needs
Hoping they’ll give you what you can’t find in yourself
And you’ll wish you could take it back but you have to leave it be
You’ll want peace, you’ll come up empty
Ruminating keeps them with you
someone will always forgive you
Remember that you’re not in the right
Your selfish empathy will always come to light
You don’t want to be all someone needs
Didn’t you say that you’d be enough for yourself?
You’ll always want to talk again
Fuck common sense and be a friend
You should move on
They’re fading in and out of view
Revolving in your hotel room
But it’s you, you’ve stayed too long
You will never give them what they needed
They will never give you what you needed
It takes so much out of you just to leave it alone
And these things always take on a mind of their own
After what you’ll let happen
Do what you can so it doesn’t again
Talk it out lay it down find a way to stabilize
And accept it’s okay when they need to leave your life
After what I did
I’ll do what I can so it doesn’t again
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