Levi The Poet - ANXIETY lyrics

And knowing how i’d shake sometimes
He asked if i could help
Explain his wife’s anxiety
Saying every time he tried to
Be her sounding board
He – in his lack of understanding –
Became more an object of envy
While simultaneously reflecting her
Own disdain for
The stranger she found herself
Exchanged for in
His chest like a mirror where –
For some reason – his love beat at regular
Intervals and normal patterns
And only skipped when, and i quote
"she’d beat electric fists into me
Like defibrillating a healthy heart while
Hers was under arrest"
And she begged him to understand but –
And i quote – "i can’t"



And knowing how she’d shake sometimes
And try to communicate through stutters when
The cogs in her mind jammed
And caught the wheel of another
Thought vying for her attention
I – oh almighty i –
Became more a silver lining
Combined with a witch available to
Burn depending upon the outcome
Like maybe my tongue could breed
Magic that douses the fires
And i quote, "staked between us
They are high"

(and i surmised, "and getting higher")

Maybe i’ll light the match myself

I thought of my own wife and
Wondered if either of them knew
What they’d gotten themselves into
When they got into it with us

"the shame compounds upon it'self
When all that
I’ve begun to call ‘god’s platitudes’ don’t
Help and the shaking has given way
To an anger i can’t maintain
Or a panic I can’t suppress as a fuse
(whose length you can
Probably guess) constantly
Rubbing up against "strike anywhere matches
" otherwise known as people

Flint so nonconsensual in the flame
Created by the iron i
Like to think of myself as that they find
Themselves at a complete loss for
How they ever got
So tangled up in the tinder i actually am

The ones in closest and most
Consistent proximity light the fastest
And burn the hottest and as
Long as i continue
To describe them as the spark
That is always setting fire
To my rope then i can remain the victim
Alternatively, you will never cease to hear
My omnipotence positioned in the phrase:

'oh, so it’s my fault, again?'

And in this way, i can make certain i am the
First and the last, the
Beginning and the end
So omniscient in every conversation
That i can
Feel myself slipping away while i speak
Insisting that i am in my right mind

Is this making sense so far?

We don’t know who we are in here

I understand that, for the most part
History only celebrates martyrdom
For the ones who didn’t make a spectacle of
Lighting themselves on fire
She doesn’t want your sentiments
We do not want to personify the void any more
Than you want to be swallowed up by us
As black holes absorbing all of
The light that you fell
In love with when our
Stars were still exploding

Of course we envy the calm that emanates
From the way you are able
To choose which candy bar you’d like
To purchase at the gas station

It’s blinding

Of course we’re angry when you
Ask, "well, i don’t know
What would you like to share?"

As if
We know
As if i have any idea

And if i’m already shaking because
I can’t make a decision
Between Reese’s Pieces and Starburst
Then how am i ever supposed to
Go fearless into our future
With every infinite possibility
Lingering with chalkboard nails
Inside my head?

"just pick a candy bar"

If i could just get it out
We might set one another free
Still – for some reason
Completely unbeknownst to
Me – firm in my belief
That the greatest gifts have been
Beadlets of empathy sweat out like
Pores drained of their blood
When the time has come to
Kiss in this garden
And whether it is for betrayal
Or passion or both
Beneath the dichotomy between words
Separated by and "you are not floating alone
In this awful void"
Seems to retain it's standing as
The surefire echo of transcendence incarnate

I couldn’t get out a whisper

The only thing i managed to do was shake
But somehow, i think it was enough
Instead of burning the witch
He looked at me as if to say
"i’ve seen that paralysis before"

Mouth open as an echo chamber
I guess that i was just empty
Enough for him to hear it