I met a boy who looked like the face of surrender
You know what I asked him? I said
I said, boy, you got something inside of those eyes that's alive?
He said, I gave it up, gave it all up long ago,
And I know only that there's just too much to know,
And you live until living just feels like the dead.

You got all these nightmares reined in at your stables,
Got knives in the kitchen and marks on the tables,
And they're all just wrapped up inside of your head
And you'll ride out the nightmares, you'll bare all the arms
And you'll bandage your cuts and they'll sound the alarms.
Cause you live until living just feels like the dead.

You think about dying a lot and it's strange
All you hear about home is the home on the range
while you're there in Alaska locked up at home, going deranged
Though they tell you that normal is some sort of cure,
but honest to God you're not sure?
And honest to God, don't you care what they said.
Cause you're here and you know it's a blessing to breathe,
To share all your maladies with the bereaved,
to laugh like two years past you wouldn't have even believed.

And you rip all those monsters right out of your head
And you clear them away out from under the bed
And your hands feel icy and heavy as lead
While I'm reading that story you told me you read
about living until we all feel like the dead

There are days that you spend, you look back on the morning, it feels a million miles away
There are days that you waste, don't you wish you could slip back and cradle them, keep them all locked up and safe?
There are mornings and nights that I've missed more than you, that I've missed like a thought that's just starting to burn
And for all that it's worth and for all that I've loved you I've still got a few things I just won't return
I'll be there to hold you until all the altars are black and the rivers have died in their beds
But I'm living in something, and God only knows that I can't let it all waste away in my head
You look at me, look at me, tell me it's fine, and if so then it's fine for my own peace of mind
But if something is broken then wind all my clocks up, 'cause every mistake is just me running right out of time.

You know that I'm parched, God, I feel so dry, and I'm choking on questions like who, what, and why
while people around me are struggling just to get by,
And they've told me that normal is some sort of curse
they say it could always be worse
but honest to God, I don't care what they said.

'Cause I'm here in the summer, it's humid as hell, and winter's determined to kill me as well,
and if I just died up here, God even knows who they'd tell
And I sang with a hope that they'd read every note,
if you look you can see all the words that I wrote
on my heart, in this ocean, wrapped up in your coat
I was hopelessly trying to keep it afloat
and trying to live, though i feel like the dead.

and dear God, it's just everywhere sometimes, you know?
more vast and more dark than you thought it could grow
that disease always lying beside you in bed.
and i'll try, fuck, i'll try, 'til the sweet bitter end
that the both of us always saw coming, and then
i'll sleep, because living just feels like the dead.

I met a boy who looked like the face of surrender
You know what I asked him? I said
Boy you got something inside of those eyes that's alive?
He said I gave it up, gave it all up long ago,
And I know only that there's just too much to know,
And you live until living just feels like the dead.

But I don't want to lose it all
But I don't want to lose it all
And you said --
And you said --