1. |
Daedalus
03:43
|
|
||
|
Your postcard ghost
sleeps by my door most every night:
ragged, stampless, half-inscribed.
I close my eyes,
hear it fading by and by,
like your shape when we drank wine,
like we did a hundred times,
but I just can’t let you inside.
You are my life.
Remember how we’d watch them die,
all those poor boys trapped inside
the maze I’d hide
from your gleaming sacred eyes?
The myth I always knew you’d find,
the beast we tried to leave behind.
We leave together, no goodbyes.
I’ve never felt so full of sin.
The wax felt good upon my skin,
too hot to touch, it settled in,
but it’s this Daedalan mess:
how when you died I died within.
My son, don’t let new people in.
They want your wings.
They want your ghost.
But, oh, I let you fall.
|
||||
2. |
You
02:46
|
|
||
|
I sat inside.
I crawl.
You made it through
last fall.
You.
You.
|
||||
3. |
Axis
02:57
|
|
||
|
Should I lie
and tell you goodnight
is what I had in mind?
Cause that shape in the doorway's where you're meant to find.
You say you don't mind.
Well, here we lie
in the absence of people and time,
with nothing to hide from but our own eyes:
judgmental and blinded from all that thrown lye.
You kiss me goodnight.
Your phone rings nine.
We wake up the site of a crime,
a cold case of distance distributed evenly over a line,
but the warmth that we found here just clicks on the light:
unsteady and bright.
You and I can tell what's not right,
and you and I just ignored that tonight.
If you come to regret what transpired that's fine,
because half of it's yours and the other half's mine.
|
||||
4. |
Days
03:03
|
|
||
|
Came home late and I stared at the door.
Checked the fridge, dropped the milk on the floor.
How does the world view a man in a bed?
How does a man view the world in his head?
How does the world perceive me
perceiving it?
Forgot to the lock the doors but nobody broke in.
Guess we’ve got nothing that they’re interested in.
|
||||
5. |
Hold It Still
00:43
|
|
||
|
I miss my band and I miss my old friends,
and I’m worried the ones who remain just pretend,
and I’m scared that this moment of happiness might someday end.
Well, I know that it will
so I’ll hold it still in my head.
|
||||
6. |
Post-Baltimore
02:02
|
|
||
|
Well, this is the end
in your room, on your phone, on your phone,
on your couch, on the floor,
in the snow I found you below.
You tell me so.
How that time that you wished you could die I showered alone,
freaked out and at home.
Freaked out and at home,
I showered alone.
I can't prove you wrong,
but I'll try and I'll try and I'll try,
till you're angry and yelling and crying.
Now I'm crying and yelling and angry.
You tell me to go,
and the wind chill is 30 below,
and the hollow we chose to let go breathes in:
real deep and real slow.
I guess I should get home.
|
||||
7. |
I
00:51
|
|
||
8. |
Away Team
03:20
|
|
||
|
It ran late.
They disguised you in makeup and paste;
smoothed out the lines that had pockmarked your face.
It was great.
Loved the song that the radio played
as emergency lights filed on by one on the highway
to watch us put you away.
Then we ate
penne al vodka from catering trays
as various guests made attempts at remembering my name.
Stayed up late.
Had my mom define passing away,
as she held to my father who wiped his nose with his cuff
as he offered a meek, “I’m okay.”
I was eight.
And I don’t quite know why, when you passed,
the first thing I did when I heard was I laughed.
|
||||
9. |
Stilled
02:18
|
|
||
|
Bear me through.
My tongue turned blue.
It stuck right to
yours in the wintertime.
I’ll hold you till
my brain grows ill.
Then you’ll grow still,
and I’ll ask you if you feel alright.
Your silence sheets the bed with ice.
Goodnight.
|
||||
10. |
Tough Beans
01:04
|
|
||
|
I get bummed out over menial stuff.
It’s that constant impression that I just fucked up:
how the Mennonites stare when I ride on the bus,
or the look in your eyes when I don’t want to fuck.
I just want to be more than enough,
but I guess that’s just tough beans.
|
||||
11. |
Palm Reading
02:31
|
|
||
|
I saw the veins connecting lines inside your hands and wondered if trees
wouldn’t just absorb you if you dared
to climb them.
I considered articulating this, but
jumped, grabbed a limb, and flung myself upwards
before I had the chance, rapidly
emerging victorious in a one
man race to the
top.
Haphazardly hanging off the trunk, I glanced down through a serendipitous
parting of leaves framing your
face
staring up at me,
staring down at you,
smiling up at me.
I considered diving straight down, but
instead let go with one
arm,
daring the moment to hold me still as perfection,
asking myself what profound thing anyone
could possibly have to say about
this,
before tearing down the branches with as
much recklessness, abandon, and care as anyone should
as they move towards their visible future
staring up at them,
staring down at it,
smiling up at them.
|
||||
12. |
II
00:55
|
|
||
|
We sleep in our parked cars.
We find our hearts in pieces.
When we leave them
We will learn that we cannot go far.
We can’t go far.
|
||||
13. |
|
|||
|
You made eye contact all the time
as if to check if I had died.
Admittedly, it wasn’t wise
to do this in the car with all the windows
shut tight.
I hadn’t seen you in a while,
And yea, I guess I’m doing fine.
I suppose we’re living different lives,
but we can just pretend tonight
if you like.
Our bodies lit. You sat upright,
looked down at me with shuttered eyes,
and asked across the artificial light:
“Is this alright?”
|
||||
14. |
Arby, I Love You
06:17
|
|
||
|
I used to love like that postcard you sent:
worn out and ragged, romantic and bent,
desperate to reach you to let you know when
I’d return to pick up where I left.
I used to give away portions of me,
hand them to strangers I’d pass on the street,
and I still remember how broken I’d be
when they wouldn’t give themselves back to me.
I met a woman whose head was on fire.
I embraced her too tightly and quickly expired.
Well, you know that she warned me if you get too close you’ll get lit,
so I crossed my heart and jumped off the cliff.
I’m probably wrong, but I feel like I’ve changed.
The blood in my sink’s just an oral mistake.
When our skins sting with day-glo I won’t be afraid
to say, “You’re alright. I’m alright. We’re okay.”
Arby, I love you like Jesus loves wine.
I won’t die without you. I won’t be divine,
and your toes, yea, your fingers, the function just fine,
but they feel awfully holy in mine.
|
||||
Dad Culture Records Potsdam, New York
~ DIY record label out of Potsdam, NY~
(photo credit to Devyn Halter & Liam Kingsley)
Dad Culture Records recommends:
sad songs // hella good timez
go to album
ughhhhhhhhhh mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ughhhh
go to albumIf you like Vestigialist, you may also like:
Westward, to Nowhere
by Ian McCuen
This sweet, mournful “loose concept” album from folk artist Ian McCuen tracks a journey across the bleak landscape of American life.
go to album
somebody had to
by phoneswithchords
The gentle lo-fi songs on the latest phoneswithchords LP develop their granular sketches of childhood and coming of age into full portraits.
go to album
Not A Party At All
by Lambs & Wolves
Charming German indie pop with the keen melodic sensibilities and melancholic undercurrent of some of the style's best practitioners.
go to album
Virtual Heaven
by Infinity Crush
Despite its themes of isolation and loneliness, Caroline White's latest batch of folk-pop confessionals is an LP brimming with confidence.
go to album
