You Were But A Ghost In My Arms

(album: The Mantle - 2002)

Like snowfall, you cry a silent storm
Your tears paint rivers on this oaken wall...
Amber nectar, misery ichor
Cascading in streams of hallowed form
For each stain, a forsaken shadow

You are the lugubrious spirit
Etched in the oak of wonder
You are the sullen voice and silent storm

Each night I lay
Awakened by her shivering silent voice
From the shapes in the corridor walls
It pierces the solitude like that of a distant scream
In the pitch-black forest of my delusion...

With each passing day, a deeper grave...

"Why did you leave me to die?"
"Why did you abandon me?"
"Why did you walk away and leave me bitterly yearning?"

Her haunting, contorted despair was etched into the wood's grain
Though fire rages within me, no fire burns fiercer than her desire
The shape whispers my name...

I damn this oak!
I damn her sorrow!
I damn these oaken corridors
That bear the ghosts of those I've thrown away!

Though tempted I am to caress her texture divine
And taste her pain sweet, sweet like brandy wine
I must burn these halls, these corridors
And silence her shrill, tormenting voice
Forever...

Like snowfall, you cried a silent storm
No tears stain this dust in my hands
But from this ashen gray, her voice still
Whispers my name...

You were the lugubrious spirit
Who haunted the oak of wonder
You were the geist that warned this frozen silent storm
You were but a ghost in my arms