Snapshots

He sits in his room
Drawing pictures of the world we left behind,
Of Danger and Doom --
Snapshots of another place and time,
And I’m still here, but barely second best.

And sometimes he smiles;
He tells me he still loves me, but he lies,
For I’ve seen the miles
Stretching out like headstones in his eyes
Because we’re here, because we failed the test.

The river is wide, the river is deep,
The river will rock their souls to sleep,
But we all had promises to keep,
And I’ve kept mine.
The bridges we burned, the bridges we crossed,
The lessons we learned weren’t worth the cost,
And when we returned, we found we were lost
For all of time.

And yes, I’m a fool;
I love him, and I guess I always will.
We broke every rule,
But when we reached the high point of the hill
We turned and looked at what we’d left behind.

And yes, I could leave;
I could walk out of the door and start again,
But I still believe
That someday he’ll come back from way back when,
And I’ll be here for him to finally find.

The river is dark, the river is old,
The river is bitter, black and cold,
And all we can own is what we can hold,
So he's not mine.
The wishes and lies, the games that we played,
The bitter goodbyes -- we were betrayed --
And all that survives is what good we made
In such short time.

And sometimes I can see them on the riverbank when the fog rolls in,
And sometimes I can hear them when they call my name when they name my sin,
And sometimes I believe them when they tell me hope was my only crime,
And sometimes I forgive them for leaving me behind...

He sits in his room
And I close the door between us when I cry;
I guess that it’s true;
Sometimes you forget that you can fly,
And sometimes life is nothing like you planned.

Now tell me we’ve won.
We’re the ones who made it out and got away,
But when the day’s done
I never find the things to do or say
To bring him home, or make him understand.


Written on: 2005-03-02. Seanan McGuire