"Caffeine"

Pour shame all over us
Harden into a crust
---cement---
Forget the glamour and
Mumble a jackhammer
---under your breath---

Hide your face in the curtains
Better unsaid so close
And it rolls off the tongue
ALMOST

The world expects a pose
Perfectly natural
---loosen up---
Smearing wet concrete and
Swearing you'll never be
---caught---

At your weakest, etched in stone
And we're frozen here, peeking

ALMOST, sweet talk, CAFFEINE

Make contact
Up to my neck
I confess in quicksand

"But it's so easy for you"
"Yeah, there's always one thing"
"Do you have something to tell me?"
"Say something"
"Anything"

I'm warning you
I'm warning you
I'm fucking you
I'm warning you

"Relax"
"It's just a phase"
"You'll grow out of it"

Believe anything anyone ever tells you

It's not funny anymore
It's the thing you hate the most
The thing you hate the most
The thing you hate ALMOST

"Midlife Crisis"


Go on and wring my neck
Like when a rag gets wet
A little discipline
For my pet genius
My head is like lettuce
Go on dig your thumbs in
I cannot stop giving
I'm thirty-something

Sense of security
Like pockets jingling
Midlife crisis
Suck ingenuity
Down through the family tree

You're perfect yes, it's true
But without me you're only you
Your menstruating heart
It ain't bleedin' enough for two

It's a midlife crisis...

What an inheritance
The salt and the kleenex
Morbid self attention
Bending my pinky back
A little discipline
A donor by habit
A little discipline
Rent an opinion

Sense of security
Holding blunt instrument
Midlife crisis
I'm a perfectionist
And perfect is a skinned knee

You're perfect yes it's true
But without me you're only you
Your menstruating heart
It ain't bleedin' enough for two

It's a midlife crisis...

"RV"


Backside melts into the sofa
My world my TV and my food
Besides listening to my belly gurgle
There ain't much else to do
Yeah, I sweat a lot
Pants fall down everytime I bend over
My feet itch
Yeah - I married a scarecrow

I hate you
Talkin' to myself
Everybody's staring at me
I'm only bleedin'

Someone taps me on the shoulder every 5 minutes
No on speaks English anymore
Would anybody tell me if I was getting stupider?

I hate you
Talkin' to myself
You don't feel it after awhile
You take the beating

I'm a swingin' guy
Throw a belt over the shower curtain rod
And swing---
Toss me inside a hefty
And put me in the ground

A drink needs me
I don't
I ain't about to guzzle no tears
So kiss my ass
Newscasters, cockroaches, and desserts

I hate you
Talking to myself
Everbody's staring at me
I'm only bleeding

Where are the kids?
Maybe getting pregnant or on drugs or on welfare
On top of the world on the honor roll on parole
On the dodgers on the backs of milk cartons
On stakes in the middle of cornfields
On covers of future history books on old lady's mantles
Walkin' on water nailed on crosses

I think it's time I had a talk with my kids
I'll just tell 'em what my daddy told me
YOU AIN'T NEVER GONNA AMOUNT TO NOTHIN'

"Smaller And Smaller"

Drought makes the workers dream
Muscles and fields of green
Shovel the last few crumbs
Of generosity
Open heart, open mind, open mouth, open vein
DRAIN
Someday the rains will come
My blistered hands tell me
Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow

BITE
BITE
BITE
CRY

I'll keep coming back
Smaller and smaller and smaller
Squash me
Smaller and smaller and smaller
Under the charity
Smaller and smaller and smaller
Under the topsoil
Smaller and Smaller and smaller
Under the fingernail
Smaller and smaller and smaller

Then the small becomes all becomes all...... P>

BITE
BITE
BITE
CRY

(It's not a mirage)
(It's not a mirage)
(Trickling downward, trickling downward)
(It's not a mirage)

DRAIN
DRAIN
BITE
BITE
BITE
CRY

Smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller.......

"Everything's Ruined"


Things worked out better than we had planned
Capital from boy, woman and man.
We were like ink and paper
Numbers on a calculator
Knew arithmetic so well
Working overtime
Completed what was assigned
We had to multiply ourselves

A bouncing little baby
A shiny copper penny

And he spent himself
Would not listen to us
But when he lost his appetite
He lost his weight in friends

Baby became a fat nickel so fast
Then came puberty
Exponentially
Soon our boy became a million

People loved him so
And helped him to grow
Everyone knew the thing that was best
Of course, he must invest

A penny won't do P>

But he made us proud
He made us rich
But how were we to know
He's counterfeit

Now everything's ruined P>

 "Malpractice"

The crowd roars
It's deep and so unhealthy
The rest you know
I feel the hands that felt me

Cold hands
Your hands
Cover my mouth
While I'm staring into bright lights

APPLAUSE

The crowd roars
The gurgling and the groping
The rest you know
Ten lovers violating

Knuckle white
Ruffle white

The crowd roars
They've ruined and repaired me
The rest you know
The hands removed the bad thing

MIRACLE

"Kindergarten"

Return to my own vomit like a dog
Rhymes and giggles muffle the dialogue
Carve my initials in a tree I will never leave
Maybe one day I'll be royalty

Kingdom
Kindergarten
Born late
Will I graduate

Drinking fountains are shorter than they used to be
The swings on the playground don't even fit me anymore
Folklore: Nobody's supposed to believe in the next grade
WRITE IT A HUNDRED TIMES

Kingdom
Kindergarten
Waiting
Bells not ringing

Everthing got quiet suddenly; no dolby
The theatre is empty
Film is flapping on the side of the projector
The reel is over
Banished with my sticky shoes and stinging eyes
I'M WALKING OUTSIDE

Kingdom
Kindergarten
Born late
Will I graduate

Held back again

"Be Aggressive"


I started this
It's all for me
What's yours is yours and mine is mine
That's plain to see
So give it up
I've got to have

I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW

Be aggressive
B-e aggressive
B-e a-g-g-r-e-s-s-i-v-e

What someone else
Would leave behind
And spit it out, let go to waste
I claim is mine
You're my flavor of the week

I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW

Tall and reckless
Ugly seed
Reach down my throat
You filthy bird
That's all I need
This empty pit
I've got to feed
To prove I'm fit
A healthy man I've got to be
Malnutrition, my submission
You're the master
And I take it on my knees
Ejaculation
Tribulation

I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW, I SWALLOW

Be aggressive
B-e aggressive
B-e a-g-g-r-e-s-s-i-v-e

Go, fight, go, fight, go, fight, win

"A Small Victory"

A hierarhcy
Spread out on the nightstand
The spirit of team
Salvation is another chance
A sore loser
Yelling with my mouth shut

A cracking portrait
The fondling of trophies
The null of losing
Can you afford that luxury? A sore winner
But I'll just keep my mouth shut

It shouldn't bother me
But it does

The small victories
The cankers and medallions
The little nothings
They keep me thinking that someday
I might beat you
But I'll just keep my mouth shut

It shouldn't bother me
But it does

IF I SPEAK AT ONE CONSTANT VOLUME
AT ONE CONSTANT PITCH
AT ONE CONSONANT RHYTHM RIGHT INTO YOUR EAR,
YOU STILL WON'T HEAR, YOU STILL WON'T HEAR

"Crack Hitler"

Sink the eight ball
Buy the lady a drink
And nobody knows my name
Bodies float up
From the bottom of the river
Like bubbles in fine champagne

He's the one, no doubt
Walking on the tight rope
He's the one, no doubt

Got a gash on my head
And a grin on my face
And a shadow called danger
Hidin' in the sheets
And on the streets
In the hearts of every stranger

Here he comes, look out
Teach the world a lesson
Here he comes, look out

Sweat on the brow
And a tap on the phone
And lives are on the line
Pick up the briefcase
On a high speed chase
Breathin' by the roll of the dice

Reachin' up to the top
We're depending on you
Reachin' up to the top

"In regards to
The usage of the drug...
It modified my personality
To the extent that I was
Highly irritable."
"I was like a crack Hitler."

Keep up the fight
And in the wink of an eye
Never give up

Ooh...ahh...
Look out