The Corner I Saw Bayside

The wind is cold, the air crisp and the ground hard

I’m following someone but it’s not my thoughts

And I float by past all the noise of bars

With the constant buzzing in my head of oughts and ought nots

Shamed but determined and ready to finally end up somewhere

A quick left, I’m drawn to the space ahead

And in the space a swing that lolls back and forth

A measured and quiet course

Someone was on it but they’re gone now

This is what troubles me

But wait, there are two versions to this story

One is fulfilling, the other hath greater glory

One true, maybe one false, the other being exaggerated or false

Either one is suitable for me

But I know my film is going to tank

And I will have wasted good storytelling to failure

So I’ll ask you to hail your cabs if you’ll miss the greater glory

Because this, well, is the actual, uncut story

Paranoid, fluttering in the wind

I’m like a length of celluloid

Every image and thought represented, frame by frame

But theres no sound, no projection

I’m alone

Suddenly a projector, yes!

Yes a projector! This is what I’ve been waiting for

And now I wait no more

To finally see what I want to see among the cold and black

The vacuum that I know is God

I walk down the center of this hallowed pier

Turning to the right, yes there’s the corner I saw bayside

I would be there if I was Him

And so I spoke and sighed, choked and nearly cried

Lost myself to the ocean but I swam back again

And every grievance I had ever had blazed skyward

Forward, backward, parallel and perpendicular to the shore that edged me in and

Oh He was listening, I know, just too shocked and high to show

Me what I was asking for, what I was asking to know

Why won’t you talk to me?

The ocean’s so wide, so vast

You must be there, you mustn’t cast my blazing words overboard

I want to see you, I want to see you, I WANT TO SEE YOU

The ocean’s so wide, so vast

You must be there, you mustn’t cast my blazing words overboard

I want to see you, I want to see you, I WANT TO SEE YOU

The wind continued to reject my words, blasting them to my face

And it thought them absurd

My arms were weak and my body slow

Like a tall, tall tree trying to turn toward the Sun

But I turned, only human, and left the pier of my dreams

Passing myself by the projector

Witnessing the awe and disgust traveling over my face

Slowly, as it was cold outside

Disbelief and anger with the ending of the picture show

Both of my selves turn slow

Like two tall, tall trees trying to turn toward the Sun

And we go back the way we came

The space from whence we came, again as one

And in the space a swing that lolls back and forth

A measured and quiet course

Someone was on it but they’re gone now

This is what troubles me