Baptismal

(album: Holy Smokes Future Jokes - 2020)

Rickety, raggedy lost boy beating off
Laughing at his face in a spoon
Same lame gamers in your sister's basement
Breaking ties with the animal world
An unspoken curse, but the pain is real
Your cousin and his girlfriend behind the wheel
Shatterproof glass on the passenger side
Covered in red in the moon's blue light
On the curb with a blanket and your bloodshot eyes

Now you're stepping in the river
In the waist-high water
Let the current take it all away

Radiant, traceless, clear, and empty
See the cheerleaders up on the rail
The beautiful sage of the anti-gods
Applies color to a press-on nail
The lights flash blue and red all night
Your cousin laid out under ghostly white
Empty bottle on the backseat floor
Filled with dreams from a forgotten shore
And your heart left open like a bedroom door

Now you're stepping to the shoulder
And the wind blows colder
Let the current take it all away

Seas rise, soft and silent
Countries shed their garments
Love lies buried deeper
Deeper, deepest
Can you find me?

In the southern branch of the energy center
That resides within my throat
There's a string bean, lost boy grinning sideways
Drowning in his coat
A blood filled skull and a curved knife
Held by his mother, daughter, lover, wife
Seen in a dream that's half a life
That shatters as he wakes and he shakes his head
He knows star crossed lovers always wake up dead
But he feels the cold world just spinning instead

Now you're stepping in the river
In the the waist-high water
Let the current take it all away