Plastic flowers on a cold level splay
Cigarettes lay sizzling in your mother fucking tarred ash tray
Forty-six and always sick, my hopes they were all gone
Vacuum lips and every bit of smoke is withdrawn
A rush of fire burns, I’m in its light
Choked up or chained down
I burned with it and I burned with you
Every time you coughed I feared the very worst
Thinking you ate smoke to cure your belly’s thirst
Like loose change in a coffee can, your throat it would burst
And I wanted better for you, strangled your days were cursed
Charred lungs and breath that smoldered
I just couldn’t see it til I got older
You spoke through crackles and you walked as if you were shackled
And I just watched, I did nothing