Verse 1
We all drag bags of bones behind us,
Rattling like bad dreams that won't forego the silence.
Some fossils are moments we never learn the shape of
Let alone the species, let alone what they were made of.
Paleontologists of our own grief,
Unearthing puzzle pieces, fumbling to untangle the sequencing.
No manual just a haunting suspicion
A one-man skeleton crew hauling raw intuition.
Trying to name what was buried before we ever knew the language,
To build back a structure that we've only observed through our anguish.
Like, this is the ledge my ghosts perch upon,
Reminding me I'm only an expert on what I am no expert on.
So what’s the ticket price to see it?
Does the morbid curiosity know that the sickness writes the thesis?
Is there an audience aware of all the grievances
Of how complicit their participation in this even is?
If there was another way to say it plainly stated,
I don't think I'd say it. I prefer the way it shapes the language.
It’s the poetry. A holy self-fulfilling prophecy
It’s unpacking all of the trauma while reforming the philosophy.
The unraveling involved in knowing
Is understanding how the hand shapes the shadow it's throwing.
Chorus
The fire leaves a footprint, ash in catacombs,
Sifting through the stanzas, scattered in the poem.
The phantom caught on camera, popping all the bulbs
You find what you've been seeking buried underneath the bones.
What if it's the ghost that's haunted by the home?
The ghost got a ghost
Verse 2
Some are born with fractured sight, but map the constellations
With a sixth sense for how the light plays off of the camera placement.
Others thumb the lens, conflate shutter speed with focus
But in their defense, the shadow’s pulse can be hocus pocus.
A novice wouldn't notice;
A savant could just as easily overlook an opus.
But as we know, the role of a projectionist
is not to critique, it’s present the image existence as it is.
So what to do when the gears grind bone dry?
Peel away the outer layer, peer in with one closed eye.
We may find ourselves elbows deep inside it's humming guts,
The moment it reanimates and breathes to life a buzzing hush
Untethered, casting flames haze-hung, and ghost-lit
Throwing frames across surfaces never meant to host it.
Who wouldn’t confuse an image appearing as it isn’t?
Who wouldn’t interpret a vision exactly how they get it?
Where the warped perspective bends and drapes the room in slanted truths,
As flames ascend in slow ballet, to kiss the roof through curtain’s fuse.
In air that thickens into smog of melted celluloid and spool,
And make a memory of man; a tragedy for fated fools.
The unraveling folds into the ending
As a feature presentation of an unknown comprehending.
Hook
The fire leaves a footprint, ash in catacombs,
Sifting through the stanzas, scattered in the poem.
The phantom caught on camera, popping all the bulbs
You find what you've been seeking buried underneath the bones.
What if it's the ghost that's haunted by the home
Well, what do ya know? The ghost got a ghost.