Restored

I need a frame to keep me contained as I drift in an ocean of pacific dreams. I need a place to lay myself down with my collected things underneath and around me.

Here they stack us so high, and we do the same. I am early to rise these days here in my home, where I am restored.

I plan to stay, and, to show I will stay, I surround myself with permanence. I have regrets of decisions I made, but this will not be one of those things.

Here they stack us so high, and we do the same. I have been cast aside. Now I'm reclaimed here in my home where I am restored.

Now I shall be a constant man, first to my physical space in the world, then to my love who deserves nothing less than to drift in my ocean of pacific dreams.

Here they stack us so high and we do the same. I have been thrown aside. Now I'm reclaimed, and this is my home where I am restored.


Architecture

One day I awoke a man, a full-grown man. I saw the full flow of time. And all the faces I misread in the blinding lights, I bid them each goodbye.

I made my home in buildings, magnificent buildings, a home for me.

I forgave my youthful mistakes, the ones I would have back at any cost, and hopefully no harm done. I forgave that which was done unto me. That was the easier part.

I made my home in buildings, magnificent buildings, a home for me.

I'll leave the light on for you too, only for you, a home for me. You are a home for me.


Our Time Here Is Ending

Lately old ghosts of a war that was won are gliding the city at night. On gunmetal trains and steamers of seas, before we could fly, we flew.

If our time here is ending, where will we go when our home isn't home anymore?

The land is emptying out, the watchtowers shaking. How absurd that I'd be left at the garden party amid monuments aplenty that my grandfather gave me. Oh what a century he lived and was gone.

If our time here is ending, where will we go if our home isn't home anymore?

Creature of sun, were I more courageous, the threads of our lives could have wound together. Creature of sun, your eyes seemed to glow golden that you might see me at night. And on our ride over bridges, towers elbowed old neighborhoods out of our view, and the noise of the world fell away, fell away, and before we could fly, we flew.

But if our time here is ending, could you come with me to the promised land? If our time here is ending, could we wander together your hand in my hand?

Shall we be remembered? How?

Before we could fly, we flew.

Metal Cloud, Industrial Rain

Behold! the steaming city after hours. Saccharine sweet offerings.

The skyline sweeps in. It brings candy-colored stories for the petit-bourgeoisie. They're producing things.

I caught the last American flight in.

Metal cloud, industrial rain. Forgotten are the long lost days when I loved someone.

Behold! Tankers move through canals, taking the products of industry from continent to capital, and in this way the human career advances. They're producing things.

I caught the last American flight in.

Metal cloud, industrial rain. Forgotten are the long lost days when I loved someone.

The city sings, breathe morning fog seeping out the mountain cone like dry ice in a bowl.

The city is a sink. All roads lead there, all rivers too. Continentals drive down, lashed by a dry wind to where the floodwaters come, approaching a city by train, and, in a good year, renewed by the rain.


 

Oceangoing Alone

Long ago I would go down all by my lonesome, down to the ocean that embraces the world.

The water was quiet as waves, patterns of rainfall circling like seagulls, cries without end.

Manila summits a memory bleeder, while Arcadia offers peace.

All oceangoers go on toward an unseen land they imagine will rise to greet them.

How did they find all those islands, all those explorers out on the ocean that embraces the world?

Mar Vermeio

I came upon a far shore after wandering empire. This is what I wandered for, carting centuries with me.

The glass and rock were worn by time to sand, finely ground beneath my toes, and the sun shines vermillion on the water.

I could scarcely have imagined that.

You're an undiscovered country, an impossible inland sea.

You opened up your ribcage for me, for me.

The stars are strange here. I can see them, and I want to.

You're an undiscovered country, an impossible inland sea. You opened up your ribcage for me, for me.

There were years, long years, as the world spun and I drank to it, and I could scarcely live then.

There were years, long years, where I truly thought I'd never fall in love like this again.

Seabirds colonized this shore. On oceans they flew. I opened up my ribcage for you, for you.

The City Rises

It's been a long time I've been gone. Muscular high-rises are going up everywhere these days. I'll fit right back in in spite of everything these days. This is what I tell myself.

Beaten, laid low, every blow that was thrown, and then the city rises; this is what I tell myself.

The vertical city mushrooms up, a metropolitan empire, cities built upon cities. The East River is a hall of mirrors, fat with the pickings of the Empire State, swollen beyond its normal strength, buoyed by the rain and the hurricane and the transformation and the transformation.

Beaten, laid low, every blow that was thrown, and then the city rises; this is what I tell myself.

Did you hear? They're building a new building on the water. Some of y'all might live there. Others will pass under its shadow as if it always existed.

And still the city rises. And still the city rises. And still the city rises.

Eyes Open At Last

I walked the bridge over souls poured into the river, each life untold unto the next.

I looked on the stone skyline, my home now, built for me by builders, my eyes open at last, my eyes open.

The poses I struck, the wandering years, trying to live the lives of other men. Then to decide, opiate dreams or real life?

I made my choice, my eyes open at last, my eyes open. And I began to live again.

And slowly I rose, feeble at first, blinking at the sun like a newborn, and I began to trust my body again, and then to forget I had one at all, and just run like a child after a ball, and I began to live again, my eyes open at last, my eyes open.

And as I ran, the sun framed my form, framed by the city under construction, and I began to live again, my eyes open at last, my eyes open.

And, my old friend, I will never tire of walking bridges with you.