The Truth Is...

I know too much.

What Is and What Should Never Be

I don't know what I am going to do. I'm in too deep and it's all falling apart. I've been bawling for the past hour or so and I'm not even sure why. Yes I am. Because I can't get away from it. This most hated of addictions follows me like the eyes of a marble statue--gazing lovingly into my face without a hint of real emotion--only that which kills emotion. Why does it all hurt so badly?? The shame and the embarrassment, the shame and the sorrow, the shame and, did I mention, the fucking shame?? I wish I were that marble statue; I just don't want to feel anymore. No more good, no more bad, no nothing. Then maybe, just maybe, when I can't feel anything at all, I will finally be saded, and if I'm lucky, some version of content. Until then I'm going to cry some more and lament what was and what should have been whilst I weep for what is and what should never be.

One and The Same

Once I had these grandiose visions of what my new life would be--and granted, it is quite different than what it was, however similar--but I'm learning the long (not to mention hard) way that romanticism is the way of the fool. I, unfortunately, am that fool. He says he wants to marry me, and he is serious. I am very sincerely taken aback. I darenot say anything at all, lest I say too much. Times are hard. I'm preparing for times to be only harder. I don't know if we'll make it. Sometimes I don't know if I'll make it. But I know I must. For I am The Romantic--I mean The Fool--and as such, I will forever thrive on change and that which hurts the most.

The Trees Get Wheeled Away

Anchormen spike their blood
Wear masks of mud--
Cucumbers cut to fit their eyes.
So no one would know
How tired they've grown
Of talking and telling their lies.

While your TVs change stations,
Scroll messages
Victims and Christians both drinking blood...
They'll pray for the destruction of all hatred--
More often--
Just those with hate for us.
Cause it hurts when you discover one's worse and one's better
To suffer, or cause others to
And you can live by your conscience--
Now guilt is a concept you're no longer subscribing to.

There's a virgin in my bed
And she's taking off her dress...
And I'm not sure what I am gonna do.
There's a song stuck in my head
And I can't help singing it--
Oh how I hope my singing pleases you...
Cause this is not who I've become
But what you make me into.

Oh, we got no health insurance
No cellular service
No disease they can't cure...
But we need more money to burn
So each person must learn
The dollar amount they are worth.
And those pills make me dizzy
Forgetting my body
I watch as it walks away...
But I just keep drinking the poison
And smoking the cartons,
A pack and a half a day.

So when time comes to claim me
My friends and my family will gather around my grave...
They'll believe that they knew me
And love me and miss me
And all call me by my name.

So imagine what you want
And then hold on to that thought.
Cause that's as close as it will ever come...
And believe you're where you are
Keep acting out the part--
But at the end of the day, the trees all get wheeled away...
And you'll be standing alone in a blank, blank space.


So believe you're who you are,
And stay in character...
But at the end of the play, the audience walks away.
And I'll be shivering cold on a well-lit stage.

-Conor Oberst