The Stiltwalker

(album: Dog Years - 2021)

They call me The Fire-Eater. They call me The Stilt-Walker
They call me The Giant, The Dwarf, The Puppet in the Strings
But I've been the ventriloquist standing on the high wire shouting out a sermon to pedestrians below
I've been a face-paint, lock-jaw, Chinatown, dummy perched on a lap and just begging for applause
(Just begging for applause)
I've been the popcorn, fried-dough, soda-stained spectator
(Wide-eyed and bushy-tailed and waiting for the curtain call)
You brought me a pillow, and a-and a blanket to lay on
And, damn alright let's go
Close my eyes and poof

They're burning books in the furnace, burning flags in the street
Wrapped in the tye-dye clothes of modernism holding lynch mobs for their disease
Begging for retroactive retribution, clutching electronic bazookas close in their pockets and palms
(The angel-faced militia is out for blood and the nighthawks fall from the sky)
I'm the preacher seeking refuge in the third-world standing in the ashes where the church once stood
Burned from the cigarette flick from the passenger seat of a black car SUV

I'm in the blue road, back row tenor in the choir
Standing in the synagogue, kneeling in the mosque screaming
"Bring me to your leader baby, bring me to your God"
Rip me from these R.E.M. sleep, blood-stained bedsheets
Take me to the hospital to tranquilize and behave
(I'm your bathtub pharmacist, still-birth vampire)

I'm your jingle hat jester juggling in the marketplace
Clap for the clown, children. Feed me to the dogs
I'm a free-range, free world, free love, free bird
Shackled by the culture like a prisoner of war