The Dark. I Am Not Afraid.

White light

Maybe time to go.

Surrounded by all my love, dozing off

Persuaded by my mother’s fear

Deathbed sinner’s prayer.

Fingers crossed.

I will not lay in bed

With a wheel turning in my head

Trying to figure out the spread

On someone else’s bet

 

 When she finally broke, everything stopped for awhile.  Her frozen raspberries melting on the plastic plate, neglected because it’s hard to eat during a storm.  “The queen,” she said, “she tells me to do things.  I hear her in my head, and she threatens to do bad things to me if I don’t listen.”  She’s handing me the key, hoping I can be trusted with it.  Years of instructions from the real, and counter-demands from the imaginary.  Threats of punishment from each.  “I feel like I’m the most sensitive kid in school.  People tell me that all the time.”  I am not prepared.  Her little heart resting in my hands, and tear-filled eyes begging me to make it all stop.  This is your fork in the road, dad.  Choose wisely.

 Dinner’s on the table

Your mother’s at the door

Kids are watching TV

You’re never needed anymore

You’re never needed anymore

You’re never needed anymore

Telephone is ringing

Bill collectors buy and sell

I may not be in heaven

But you’re in hell

 

Rising to speak, one by one, they measured the gate by chapter and verse.  Which color sends the message correctly? How tall should it be?  We travelers listened with guarded ears.  Are they speaking of us?  Do they know that we can hear them?  The lines are drawn more clearly.  A smaller door, they say, with a height requirement. If we make it small enough that nobody else can enter, then nobody else can ruin it.  We travelers move on, nomads by requirement, not by choice.  The trouble with fences, we say, is they ruin whatever they’re guarding.  By the time the fence is up, there’s nobody waiting to enter.  Besides, we’re just not small enough to fit.

 Ok, I’ll lay here a little while

If you’ll promise to run our history

Through my head

When my horizon flipped

Started making lists

And I’m never gonna rest in peace

In your debt

I will not lay in bed

With a wheel turning in my head

Trying to figure out the spread

On someone else’s bet

 

 At night, the thought of my last bed comforts me.  Cold. Dark. Quiet.  Consciousness gone, a brief flickering in an otherwise empty space. With no memory of before, and by then, no memory of the past, my natural state resides there, in the nothing.  We are out of character above ground, feigning importance, daring to think these trials and feelings have value.  As I fall asleep, my anchor is that place, in that bed.  Of all losses and pains, harms and gains, I have found comfort in the only thing that can’t be taken away.  

Italic lyrics by D. Bazan