Just How I Feel, Pt. 2

(Album: I'll Leave The Light On Just In Case - 2019)

One day, Confucius was out for a walk with his disciples
And he saw an old man fall into a big mountain stream
And thought, "Alas, he is sick and old and tired of life and he is making off with himself"
For below where the point where he fell in was an enormous cataract
And then, uh, rocks and rapids underneath
But suddenly, the old man appeared way down below the rapids
He crawled out of the stream, and went strolling along the banks
Confucius was amazed
And he immediately sent a disciple to run after the old man so that he could talk to him
He said, "Sir, I thought you were about to make away with yourself
But I see now that you must be a spirit"
And he said, "No, I'm not a spirit, I'm just a perfectly human being."
"Well, then how did you survive the cataract?"
He said, in no special way, "I just went in with a swirl and came up with a whirl"
"I did nothing, I simply adapted myself to the nature of the world"
And so in the same way, we have, he'd connected with the Daoist
And Zen, early zen traditions
Many instances of famous monks who were quite mad
On the announcement for this series of workshops and seminars
There is a drawing of Hanshan
And he and his companion, Shide
As the Japanese say, "Kanzan and Jittoku"
They were two mountain hermits
Who are favorite subjects of Zen artists

This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
Even if I die
I'm, I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine

I will try not to acquiesce to the idealism I built in my head
Consumed by an inaugural address in the corner of a concrete room with bittersweet lateral grooves
The remnants of this commencement dissipate through the trees and a forest leading to the fountain of life
Where we'll lose a fight when the continuum of life ceases to simply comply with the energy we occupy
'Cause when we're alive it's connected to our thoughts
Which means the energy can be connected to our love or our hope
And when we finally choke
The energy will move on and our swan song will simply be an echo
So we can let go

Hey John, this is a poem idea I have
I don't know if I've fleshed it out enough
I don't know if I'm saying more than I should
Without understanding it completely but I want you to hear this
God is a camera and if you're not ready to show everything on camera
Then you should be — you should not be in the scene
I wanna be something, but I don't want to feel the weight of accepting responsibility
So I don't drive down the roads where my dead friends used to live
I don't drive by the house where my innocence died as a kid
I was supposed to be at the Church of Christ, not the Church of Vices
But now I'm afraid to love someone who isn't like this
So I changed the radio station when they played the new Eminem featuring Ed Sheeran
'Cause I don't need another white pop star collaboration to define my generation
Forgive me, friends, I created this world in my head
I'm sorry you have to live with it
Nah, scratch that
Forgive me, friends, I'm selfish
[?] Call me back buddy
Bye