i let the corner of your wedding dress
fall from my hands as you told me not to stand
your eyes held mine with a tiredness
politely you bid me goodbye for one last time
there are no songs for the broken heart that comes
when you lose lifelong friendship and love

i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how

wasted so much time looking for where it was first broken
i was wrong, you were wrong, i was wrong, you were wrong
i've tried to claim all the fault as mine
my sobbing apologies echoing that parking lot
but there's been no healing in taking that responsibility
i was given up long before my dishonesty
i still wake in agony of tears
longing for you and all we've lost

i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how

tears race silently as i listen to news of you
the torn corn bleeds fresh
deep within me the parts you nurtured
rattle and scrape broken while my hands reach
i'm reminded  "you only break her heart,
she doesn't want you there"
"i don't want you there. I don't want you" she said
my reaching falls again and I know my place

i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how

they told me this is growing up
loving each other till its not enough
that its okay to say goodbye
people they change and promises break all the time
it doesn't change the love you have
it doesn't make it all something bad
i'm sorry, I know my faults, and I'm so sorry
you have been a great love of my life
be happy be free my sister my beloved

i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how to write this one
i don't know how

Wooden and mechanical
I go through the motions
Surrounded by blooded hearts
And the colours of the living
I try to paint myself to match
But
Wooden and mechanical
My voice fails to resonate
With the bonds they share
I see it register on their faces
And feel it in my tinny bones
That I am not one of them
I am not creeping towards death
With each cycle of breath like they
I am only as alive
As my wooden and mechanical motions

The cicadas are singing, in a roaring cacophony of voices
Barely muted, by the whirring of the fans, the unwatched movie,
Your breathing slow and sleepy steady
Your heart beat warm by my ear
The air like a blanket surrounding us.
I name the colours of your eyelashes
The golden tones of you
And watch the shapeless dreams wander over your lids.
But that old complaint
Louder with each moment, each day
Demands an audience
And I cannot deny hearing it
Just as I cannot deny
The cacophony of voices,
The cicadas singing.

‘You need to learn to fight’ my mother told me on Christmas Eve.
‘It is not good to go placidly in all things. You need to fight back too’.
I held my bruised knuckles and swallowed the sob in my throat.
‘But it hurts more to fight,’ I choked.
‘I will not break my own heart’.
My mother looked at me with an old pain and memory,
‘My darling he will not make you happy if you do not fight’.