Okkervil River Starry Stairs
They ask for more
What do you think this fan club is for?
I slithered up each rose corridor
I kept a warm, safe place at my core
Before I lost it
They ask for blood
What do you think this woman's made of?
I stuck a small, thin pin in my thumb
They dreamt a low, long line to be crossed
And I crossed it
I'm alive but a different kind of life
Than the way I used to be
I retire to a split, white smile to be seen
In some old stag magazine
And this girl's eyes
When they were roughly wrenched open
I could see a starry stair up your thigh
You hid behind your hair
Oh, but I saw you smiling
While all these guys, all these curious sets of eyes
Safe behind a TV screen
I let them pry, pick apart and hang up to dry
Almost every piece of me
If you don't love me, I'm sorry
Oh, what a trip? Oh, what a shimmering silver ship?
Oh, what a hot half-life I half lived?
Oh, and the stripes and stars, how they stripped off the siding
When my life ripped off from the part that played as a kid
Into the part that plays through your lips
To find a warm, safe place and sit curled up inside it?
So, here's goodbye
From the part that's staying behind
To the part that has to leave
To the sublime lips that were never spoiled by lying
But to the face inside the being
Who wasn't me, who wasn't me
Oh, no, no, she's, she's not me, oh, oh
