Sleeping with Monsters

About two hundred miles,

the distance between you and me is spreading,

and the less I have, the more that I can taste it.

Like the blood on my lips,

like the salt in the air,

there’s a pull to a place that is not there.

“You should never commit,” she said,

“’Cause you’d never follow through, even if you wanted.”

To find the one who can make these bad dreams stop,

though they are self-inflicted; deserved.

I live to watch things fall apart.

That’s why I’m sleeping with monsters,

because there was no room under the bed

and in the closet, all boxed,

and the skeletons won’t share what is rightfully theirs.

As a child, we see ourselves as strong and everlasting,

but the older I get, I swear, the more I feel it...

Like a rock on my chest, like a weight on my back,

there’s a time and a place, but now it’s gone.

“I wish you were here,” he thought,

but she never heard a word, because he didn’t tell her.

To be the one who can heal a broken day

just with a whisper; a breath.

I’d live to watch them fall asleep...

...but I am sleeping with monsters tonight.

Since there was no one else at home

and it’s so quiet there, no sound,

and the ringing in my ears becomes a constant now.

It’s just noise.

I squeeze my eyes, but sleep won’t come.

I live in pages now; in words.

And the same words that I read, I would never say.

All the same words that I read, I would never read.

To have just one who can understand my mind

and help to calm me down with touch.

‘Cause I can’t stand to sleep alone.

So, I am sleeping with monsters from now on,

‘cause a monster is better than a ghost who disappeared; moved on.

I’m takin’ numbers over names; there is no shame in this.

Grow up, who cares who else has come before?

Just keep your pride in check; move on.

Nobody cares where you have been.

I sleep with monsters now.

Grow up.

Just take a number and move on.