Work Text:
Through the tick of the clocks and the fear of knocks
The thrum of the pipes and the dim of the light’s
The pen shall scratch and the nails will claw
Claw at skin until it is red and raw
The eyes will search and the stomach will lurch
The mind will cower as tock pass the hours
There is no solution in the numbers
Numbers that will ever keep from slumber
Spill goes the ink and vomit they think
The teeth fill with guilt and the water is spilt
They make themselves leave because they say
‘I will live to work another day’
Through the haze of thoughts and whispers in ears
The dry throat and the water clear
The numbers swirl and the skin sickens
Sickens with the veins that blacken and thicken
The hand will reach and the feet will stumble
The glass fills black inside a wall that crumbles
They tilt back their head as their tongue recoils
Recoils from chemical taste and black as oil
But the flesh is hooked and the throat is wet
The disgust that fills is ignored by them yet
They feel a wrong deep inside, but still they will say
‘I will live to work another day’
They are frantic as the numbers become all they think
Formula’s and scratching and weeping between each drink
They swear their mind is too crowed, trapped by a web
A web made by something trapped inside his head
Their friends-gangs mouths become waterfalls of concern
They demand he leaves and lets this company-home burn
Both they’re thoughts are bound to these halls
Halls where they walk from them for the veins in the walls
They know it is wrong but their body feels flawed
They should have more hands to write, move on the floor
They suppress these thoughts and compulsions and to them they say
‘I will live to work another day’
They do not know when they last saw and felt the sun
But they don’t need the sun anyway, only the dark
The dark of the corners, the dark of their veins
The veins set against the skin so thin and grey
They still get new numbers slipped beneath the door
The door they know is locked, they checked it before
Before the mechanic came and freed up the pipe
The pipe they always watch from the corner of their eye
Puddles form within their mouth and pool behind their tired eyes
Tired eyes that scan the page and continue to ask why
Why they stay for these empty equations, but their hazy mind still says
‘I will live to work another day’
Their skin is falling off in clumps, what will Joey say?
All they bleed is blackened blood, drowning in blackened debt
They don’t sleep, they need to be awake for numbers not counting sheep
They cannot solve the equations, they think as they throw up
Finally the door opens, and they squint with eyes no longer made for the light
They try to ask for help with the equation, but gurgle and spit instead
A sharp glint, a hard blow, a leaking scream, a sigh of defeat
They hope they remember the formula’s as their soul is eaten
Their body is wrong, too stretchy, too short, too many limbs
And yet it feels right at last, and they are happy to see their work again
But as they reach up and write on the walls, they find they can longer say
‘I will live to work another day’