Rings

[Verse 1]

Used to draw

Hard to admit that I used to draw

Portraiture and the human form

Doodle of a two-headed unicorn—it was soothing

Movin' his arm in a fusion of man-made tools and a muse from beyond even if it went beautifully wrong

It was tangible truth for a youth who refused to belong

No name nuisance, stews in a bedroom

Oozing a brand-new cuneiform

Barely commune with the horde

Got a whole grayscale ungluing his world

Might zone out to the yap of the magpie

Unseen hand dragging his graphite

Cross contour, little bit of backlight

Black ink after a Bristol to baptize

You can't imagine the rush that ensue

When you get three dimensions stuffed into two

Then it's off to a school where it's all that you do

Being trained and observed by a capable few

Back in New York, five peeps and a dog

In a two-bedroom, doing menial jobs

Plus, rhymin' and stealin' and being a clod

Distractions free to maraud

I left some years a deer in the light

I left some will to spirit away

I let my fears materialize

I let my skills deteriorate

Haunted by the thought of what I should have been continuing

A mission that was rooted in a twenty-year affinity

In rickety condition with an ID crisis

Nap on the front lawn, look up in the sky, it's…

[Hook]

Shapes falling out of the fringe

All heart, though we would've made cowardly kings

They will chop you down just to count your rings

Just to count your rings, just to count your rings

And there were colors pouring out of the fringe

All heart, though we would've made cowardly kings

They will chop you down just to count your rings

Just to count your rings, just to count your rings

[Verse 2]

Used to paint

Hard to admit that I used to paint

Natural light on a human face

Stenciled fire on his roommate's bass

It was blooming addiction

Amiss in the pushing of pigment

Book like a tattooed pigskin, look

Pinhead kids of the minute

Drank Kool-Aid from a tube of acrylic

And it grew up into linseed oil over linen

Joy to the poison, voice of the resin

Capture a map of the gesture

Back up, add a little accurate fat to the figure

Redo that, move that inward

Zinc white lightning shoots from his fingers

Studio strewn with illusion and tinctures

Stay tuned for the spooky adventures

You can't imagine the stars that align

When a forearm starts foreshortening right

Or a torso hung on a warping spine

In proportion reads as warm and alive

Routine day with a dirt cheap brush

Then a week goes by and it goes untouched

Then two, then three, then a month

And the rest of your life, you beat yourself up

I left some seasons eager to fall

I left some work to bury alive

I let my means of being dissolve

I let my person curl up and die

Eating up his innards, an unfeasible anxiety

Has brutally committed to relinquishing his privacy

Aligning with the trials of the anti-Midas

Nap on the back lawn, look up in the sky, it's…

[Hook]

Shapes falling out of the fringe

All heart, though we would've made cowardly kings

They will chop you down just to count your rings

Just to count your rings, just to count your rings

And there were colors pouring out of the fringe

All heart, though we would've made cowardly kings

They will chop you down just to count your rings

Just to count your rings, just to count your rings

[Outro]

I'm getting sick and tired of never understanding

Where is the truth you promised?!