I didn't show up to see this false front,
Trash in the glass of river water
Where Conquest Industries blows off its steam
And bells are embossed into concrete.
The blind philosopher flashes his eyes
On sunsetting Hudson, what I can't unsee.
My heart closed up tight as I found my right
To silence the machine that blows off the leaves,
The external validation of no
External validation, the fight I choose
To pick with myself needs willing resistance
Like a mirror for cocaine with face I can't unsee,
But the outside world has closed all its doors,
Though the sunrise reminds us how it used to be
Before we could see what it was. The whips
Are subtle now, the bullhorns tuned to chill,
The pantry full of potions to help us deal
With the truth we can no longer unsee,
The cost in inauthenticity
Shining in each eye, as you try to look away.
You're a dignitary to your captors,
They salute you, wave flags, bring you coffee
To feed your anxiety, for as long as
Your suspicions fall on you, before you unsee
The implied rod you've spared on your back side
Slow to comply — there's a child who wants to be
And doesn't understand why the invite
Has conditions she just learned now to read,
How someone else's point of view's a rule,
How everything she's learned she must unsee,
How loving bonds were forced apart by crowbars,
How she became a nail to batten down,
How every day the sand where lines were drawn
Are smoothed away, how every day the nighttime
Must redeem, what's brought to light forcibly
To blind us to that star we can unsee.
You are the captor of this see-through jail,
You are the burning earner of the sparks
The poker pries to the sky to disappear.
The ash of what's been clocked must now be swept
Before the dust upon you blackens your soul,
Before it all gets too dark to unsee.
Oh there is something there you think you have
Or at least you thought you wanted, that is not,
This time, withheld, like you can always reach
So it can slip away as soon as your hand
Shows its hand, before the barked commands resume,
That intruder at the door you now unsee.
