LYRICS
Tin Girl
Oops
Look, the power is out again
and they don’t know when it will be back
At least you’ve got your candles
to keep you company
Oops, I’m disappointed again
I guess that’s just what I get
For letting my expectations
get the best of me
Don’t look back now,
don’t you dare now
‘Cause if you do
I will turn to dust right before your eyes
And then you will be compelled to collect
the remnants of what I once was
Wishing you had made time to apologize
You said: “nothing is real in the end”
But what of the wings that I mend?
I could kill you with the blade inside my pen
Lost all my limbs in the fight
Waging what’s wrong and what’s right
You don’t think I will, but I might I might.
Look, the feeling is gone again,
that is if it was here at all
I keep my window open
just in case it calls
Oops, I’m in love again
I guess that’s just what I get
For letting you cut me open
to look inside my chest
Look ahead now, watch your step now
‘Cause if you don’t you may end up
belly up on your back
And then a crowd of ignorant people will surround you
Waiting for you to react
You said: “nothing is real in the end”
But what of the wings that I mend?
I could kill you with the blade inside my pen
Lost all my limbs in the fight
Waging what’s wrong and what’s right
You don’t think I will, but I might I might.
Out but Thru
Cracked skin, porcelain
Sharpening your claws
You smiled once, you looked happy
Like an accident on pause
Blink twice: you’re in the backyard
Watching the lilacs die
Ash covered shoulder blades
Reminiscing on when you used to fly
Go slow in the fast lane, honey
Well it looks like you’re on cue
Would I tell you what it felt like, baby
Well there’s no way out but through
Quick wit, unzipping the armour that you wear
You fashioned a blanket out of the reasons
Why you were scared
Wanting to be loved so desperately
So that you wouldn’t have to look
At the graveyard diggers that you dreamt about
Before you bit the hooks
Saw your face through the veil
My old house is up for sale
The old haunts inside my head
Are telling me I’m left for dead
There’s no place to belong
Except the inside of a song
Tell me one thing that you know:
You have to be uncomfortable
If you wanna grow.
Know Now, Then
I miss the way you held your pen
I miss the way you said my name
I may never see you again
But I have your picture in a frame
Do you still smell the same?
Do you still tell the truth?
If you ever look for me
I’ll be in the pages of our youth
I’ll cut it out, I’ll try again
If only I knew what I know now, then
Loneliness can make us do
All kinds of senseless things
All the time I spent with you
Was like a wounded pair of wings
Nostalgia is a pretty liar
Insisting things were better
Then they actually were at the time
At the time, at the time
Home Again
Always the sentimental one
Using the words you wrote down
Long ago, when you ran the show
Breaking an empty promise
Craving an affectionate cigarette kiss
Always used to the consistently inconsistent
You can’t go home again
You can go...
You can go home again
You can’t go....
Always the super cautious one
Filling the void of boredom
Living on the sly, blushing in the sky
I was restless reckless and I swear sometimes
I don’t even wanna feel
Don’t even want to heal...
You can’t go home again
You can go....
You can go home again
You can’t go....
So take off the people pleasing smile
Show them what you really know
Show them what you really know...
Salad Days
I’ve always been a moth to flame
But that don’t mean that I’m to blame
For the faulty switch inside your brain
How I long to be free of these chains
Everything is standing still
Half of me in for the kill
Hope for the best, expect the worst
Is this body a blessing or a curse?
I’m not made of tin anymore
Than I wanted to win the war
Of you and I, so what’s the use?
When all you have is some cheap excuse
You gave me grief and took my youth
And that’s the truth
You came to me inside a dream
I opened my mouth but couldn’t scream
You said: “click your heels and you’ll be home”
So I did and woke up alone
A Little Vulture Told Me
I can feel the leaky faucet of my butane brain
Flood the sad and lonely streets that pollute your veins
And I’m tired of wanting you to need me
I watch you writhe and wriggle with itchy skin
Sharing a sleeping bag with truth is not an easy thing
And I’m tired of watching you destroy you
What have you got to lose?
I’m not here for you to lose
I was trying to fill the hole inside my stupid heart
When you picked me up and placed me back into the darkest part
Of a story of a vulture that leaves you picked apart
It’s no wonder I was lazy with trying not to lose
I’m not here for you to lose
What have you got to lose?
I was carving out a way for us to dine and dash
We’ve got fear to keep us company and of course panache
I was crying when you told me not to laugh
A Moment Ago
Where did I put my confidence?
I could have sworn that I had it just a moment ago
A moment ago
You’re on the hunt for your other half
I’m just trying to figure out how to laugh
Through the pain, through the shame
Tried to fit through the hole in the wall
Walked on the tightrope but I didn’t fall
Made up a home out of a box
Yeah, you can hide but you can’t escape your thoughts
Where did I put my sense of self?
I could have sworn I was someone else just a moment ago
A moment ago
Couldn’t get out of bed for a week
Gotta try and fake it though ‘cause if you’re sad
They think you’re weak
Where did put my confidence?
I could have sworn that I had it
Just a moment ago
Just a moment ago
The Worm Song
I recall the day you called and said: “Hey I packed my bags,
I’m going on a trip and guess who’s not invited?”
Oh perfectionist, you might break a nail over this
But you ain’t gunna break any hearts so you might as well
crumble ‘Cause you ain’t gunna be missed!
I recall what I was doing that one time I was munching on an apple
and I turned my head then looked back at it
And a worm said: “Hey this is my home! Who are you to
use it for the sake of being satisfied and satiated?
Karma’s a bitch kid, I work hard - I’m dedicated!”
I know I’ll soon go mad
What with pissing off worms and reveries of days gone bad
But what good is praying going to do
When the thing you love is dying in the next room?
What good is loving going to do
When the thing you hate is laughing right beside you?
Once in a while there’s that reminder
That says “you’re not needed here, you’re just an under liner”
And they will use you and abuse you and reduce you
To nothing but a stained sheet of a
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I know I’ll soon go mad
What with pissing off worms and reveries of days gone bad
But what good is praying going to do
When the thing you love is dying in the next room?
What good is loving going to do
When the thing you hate is laughing right beside you?
The Mermaid Song
Last night I found myself weeping for all I have yet to lose
For things I wish for safe keeping, for all I have yet to prove
You gave me your porcelain shoulder
I cried for time and getting older
I cried for the wasted years
I cried for my unconquerable fears
This restless heart, what a wretched mess
It needs a bigger chest
All the love and all the hate
Growing more and less and less
You say you love me but I know
There are rooms in you I’ll never go
Do not disturb signs, doors locked shut
Passwords I could never guess with the best of luck
I guess the root of every moment and every memory
Is how you choose to remember it, oh how will you remember me?
Carrying mountains upon my back
A piece of fiction turned to fact
Binoculars to help you see
Or the sea foam that I used to be
Last night I found myself weeping for all I have yet to lose
For things I wish for safekeeping, for mountains I have yet to move
You gave me your severed ear
I treaded water in a pool of tears
I cried for who we used to be
I wept for you and I wept for me.
The Language of Eyes
Big Fish Too Soon
Let your hair down, I want to save you
They fed you to the big fish too soon
I hung around with your demon last night
He said that I brought comfort
But could never make you alright
Alright, alright, alright.
You ran into my cousin last week
She didn’t call you by your new name
You said you had a dream about me that I died
She told you I was fine but
you didn’t call to see if I was
Alright, alright, alright.
Let your hair down, I want to save you
They fed you to the big fish too soon
You said that there were three of them,
You didn’t put up a fight
They left you in the snow and you were not
Alright, alright, alright.
Cheek & Bruise
On awnings and gravestones, engraved in my bones
I didn’t see you arrive
But I best be going, I only came ‘cause I heard you were gunna be here
Oh, talk is cheap
Don’t entertain the notion
I’m too big to sit on your knee
And too small to devour your devotion
I stride into the fancy restaurant
Get myself a table by the window
Sir, can you direct me to the bathroom
if you’re not too busy?
Expensive smile, whitened to the T
Gee, I’m sure glad I’m not the one
who has to scrub these toilets
Young blood, lovely face
An existence stronger than a myth,
as useful as a rake
The colour’s coming back, the colour’s coming back
In each cheek and bruise
And I’ve got a lot of it,
I’ve got a lot of explaining to do.
I used to sit and wait
And drop everything if you happened to need me
Now you say that you couldn’t care less
if you never ever saw me
Well I’ll go away, a thoughtless misplacement
There’s always room for that
unwavering replacement
I feel like a three-legged dog being
forced to pull a sled of raw meat
But if it was written from the heart
then I don’t have to transpose anything
What’s the use? I was only trying to savour you
Time is just a series
of four-dollar photo booth snapshots
Young blood, lovely face
An existence stronger than a myth,
as useful as a rake
The colour’s coming back, the colour’s coming back
In each cheek and bruise
And I’ve got a lot of it,
I’ve got a lot of explaining to do.
Young blood, ugly face
An existence stronger than a myth,
as useless as a rake
The colour’s coming back, the colour’s coming back
In each cheek and bruise
And I’ve got a lot of love stashed away for you.
Pantomime
I stood there all in black, with my face painted white
Noticing the frame that fit around you
I said what I didn’t mean, I left without being seen
Miming all the while the wall between us
Then you leaned in for a kiss
But you couldn’t get past that which separated us
You wore my summer dress
You looked like a photograph of happiness
You said:
“Come a little closer, I promise I won’t bite.”
I knew you didn’t want to be alone.
Your halo was glowing when I visited you that night
But you sounded so defeated on the phone.
I stood among the crowd, feeling like a ghost
Remembering a time when we were strangers
I laughed the memory off, but love is like a cough
Even a small one can’t be concealed
Then you leaned in for a kiss
But you couldn’t get past that which separated us
You wore my summer dress
You looked like a photograph of happiness
You said:
“Come a little closer, I promise I won’t bite.”
I knew you didn’t want to be alone.
Your halo was glowing when I visited you that night
But you sounded so defeated on the phone.
You sounded so defeated on the phone
You sounded so defeated on the phone
You sounded so defeated on the phone.
Charming Walls
I ask you another question Just to hear your voice
I walk past your workplace
Like I have a choice
If only the moon had not skimmed my skin that night
Like a song on your pillow, a plight
And there you were like you never were
Like a faded love like light for life
Flickering about like I’m the one to blow you out
Somewhere there’s a tin girl in need of an oil change
Somewhere there’s a tin girl in need of an oil change
Your fur was so warm on my wall
Your fur was so warm on my wall
To be killed in a moment
Gorge then gasp
There’s refuge in recollection
Or regret, perhaps
If only I had not hung you on my wall
But for a painting you were so beautiful
And there you were like you always were
Like a faded love like light for life
Flickering about like I’m the one to blow you out
Somewhere there’s a tin girl in need of an oil change
Somewhere there’s a tin girl in need of an oil change
Your fur was so warm on my wall
Your fur was so warm on my wall
(Somewhere, tin girl, somewhere, in need….)
(Somewhere, tin girl, somewhere, in need….)
As It Seems
Sitting on a park bench waiting outside
You tell me to run but I wish to hide
Deep in the center of your chest pocket
So I lean in close to you so dear
Tell you all the things you don’t want to hear
Until your heart expands, arms outstretched
But that’s the problem with embraces
I don’t wanna let go and face it:
That we all collide, just to drift apart again
But at least I’m not as sad as I used to be
At least I know the meaning of sanity
A little less afraid of morning light
Lover without a lover, friend without a friend
Pay attention to the signs at every dead end
Nothing is as it seems and yet everything is
Another chance to receive all that
you’ve ever had to give
Feeling distraught and so confused
All I wanna do is comfort you
and abandon myself, yet again.
But I can’t go back to those days no more
It was different then, now I can’t ignore
All that I have learned between the lines
All the ghosts of who we used to be
Float around sometimes inside of me
That’s why I still bruise easily
But I refuse to be defined
By all that I have failed to find
I may not know who I am,
but at least I know who I’m not.
Like Losing
If I was time, would you kill me?
Would you light up with your friends
drunk in melancholy?
Laughing about how all of this
doesn’t even matter anymore
When the one you love becomes
banished from your door
And your core aches
I feel it like a weed
At the bottom of the lake
Plucked from the womb
Courageously awake
Like a sick fish
Waiting for the bait
If I was time, I would kill me
I wouldn’t be getting in the way constantly
I would not be a thief to the night
And a sickened saviour by the day
I would be hooked on the fact
That I wouldn’t have anything to say
Forever and a day
My core will ache
I feel it like a weed
At the bottom of the lake
Plucked from the womb
Courageously awake
Like a sick fish
Waiting for the bait
The Beauty of Decay
He said: “One day you’re going to run out of skin,
And then no one will be around.
Yeah, one day you’re going to run out of skin,
And then no one will stick around.”
Do you ever wish you could
work as hard as you cry?
Do you ever wish you could
laugh as much as you lie?
Do you ever feel it all:
mad and sad and free?
Do you ever wish you were
as happy as you are lonely?
She said: “One day maybe I will kick this thing,
But nothing is forever so don’t expect anything.
Yeah, one day maybe you will understand
When you lose both your parents
and your kids and your man.”
Do you ever wish you could
work as hard as you cry?
Do you ever wish you could
laugh as much as you lie?
Do you ever feel it all:
mad and sad and free?
Do you ever wish you were
as happy as you are lonely?
Yeah one day I might run out
Of skin and then no one will be around
Yeah one day I might run out
Of skin and then who’s gunna stick around?
Perfect Avocado
Open book, and out it fell
A business card to mark the spell
Can you tell me why you chase all your tails
Then chew them off without
falling in love with feeling like Braille?
Oh, the things I chose not to see
The girl I tried not to be,
So close to reality.
Oh the things we tell ourselves,
they’ll kill us in time
Oh the things I tell myself,
they keep me confined
I am a moth without wings
With eyes for ears, no song to sing
Reaching for the glow
Then there’s you, candle-faced silhouette
I cannot trace you out in this place
I do recall when you said
You would not light the waterbed
If I wasn’t there to blow it out.
Oh the things we tell ourselves,
they’ll kill us in time
Oh the things I tell myself,
they keep me confined
So I hail a cab to take me away
To where the rivers flow
with letters of your name
The Language of Eyes
You speak of romance as if it were a disease
As if your hopeless heart wanders
and would much rather be
In my hands when it lands
And your words resonate within me
How long until I start to bleed?
And your words resonate within me
How long until I stop to bleed?
Honey I’ll tie a string to your eye
Honey I’ll tie a string to your ear
Honey I’ll tie a string to your heart
And when it gets heavy, when it gets tired
I’ll be there to pull it
‘Cause I know we can never be you and I
When we are around everyone else
So give a little tug anytime
When your heart gets heavy,
when your heart gets tired
And I’ll be there to pull it
All that separates us now is inevitable time
Quietly counting the moments
I wished you were mine
When to why, the language of eyes
And again
Your words resonate within me
How long until I start to bleed?
And your words resonate within me
How long until I stop to bleed?
Will you forgive me when I opt to forget myself?
The Outskirts of Optimism
When I grow up, I want to die
When I die, I want to be in your arms.
My ma left me for the blade
My pa left me for the bottle, I was eight.
But I didn’t tell a soul
Now all I get for Christmas
Is a large lump of coal.
I used up my one and only lifeline
Now I’m riding on a smile and a shoeshine
I can’t remember how to cry
When I cry, I want to be in your arms.
You left me for the machine
I loved you, I was only thirteen.
But I didn’t tell a soul
Now I suppose you,
Well you will never know.
I used up my one and only
I screwed up but darling, I will love you only.
(mouth trumpet solo)
I used up my one and only lifeline
Now I’m riding on a smile and a shoeshine
But I ain’t complaining, I’m just waiting
On the other line, I’m on the other line
And I’m sure I’ll be fine.