Sandpaper Hymn

What is this feeling, hovering over That follows me to bed The coldest of fingers pressing my lips The fist upon my head Call me a liability from the start I thought that I could bring you more than The sum of our troubled parts Lately I'm keeping just out of reach Of friends who want to help me I know they see me for what I am And have no heart to tell me I am the circularity of my father's speech Flashes of a mother's rage at every water breach If history's nothing more than the tales We choose to tell ourselves Then why've you discarded every page Of things that I did well Have a care what's coming out your mouth Let condescending words be smoothed out If every footfall is jarring our little frames Then who will bend our stooping spines Back to their proper shape Maybe this famine hinges to feast And nourish what has died But you can't preserve me out in the cold Just 'cause you won't decide Would someone tell me my labor is complete Or give a mathematics for the day to choose defeat I swear to God, I'm learning to shut my mouth That every splintered corner be sanded clean and round --- Sandpaper Hymn - Chris DuPont