When you look at him

your eyes become moats

swirling around you

In a stream barely

as wide as the boat 

that promised your rescue.

I couldn't hear 

his sirens approach

When could you?

He was a crook 

with a name like Death

and he hooked you.

Your eyes cracked 

with tears at my side

I was your mirror

your world was my pride.

I made you think 

that it might be inside me

Hoping to keep you 

close and beside me.

You were the Lady of Shallott

Living dreams that would not sleep

Trapped in a castle 

where you were the keep

You can't even look 

out a window to see

Only at visions 

reflecting from me

Watching from angles 

you prayed to be free

Your curse could not see

your true beauty through me.

I shutter like the curious pictures 

that change when someone looks.

Burning with a furious passion 

unwritten in your books.

   

My eyes cracked 

with tears at your sigh.

I was your mirror

your shield and your lie

Hoping you could see 

a future within me

but knowing someday 

you would look beyond me.

When I see you dead

your lips 

cease 

to steam me

The crash 

of a shard 

of your kiss 

falling cleanly.

Then I reflected 

upon his approach. 

I begged you 

to see me.

You listened only 

to his bugles blow

and their shrill 

cracking.

I am shattered 

with tears at your side.

I was just a mirror

your guilt and your pride.

Your dance crazed the loom 

that was our nest

it's web 

would surround you

Tangling your softest hair 

in his crest

as it's colors 

astound you.

I'm swept up 

in a furious river

that washed 

your tears away

when they stretched my frame

with curious pictures 

of the day 

you sailed away.

You were the Lady of Shallott

living visions I sought too.

I was your mirror you saw all 

my thoughts when I dreamed about you.

You said it was just

your reflection that bored you

So you never noticed 

how much I adored you.

Death freed you from 

the castle where I keep

reliving my dreams 

if and when I can sleep.

I can't even look 

out a window and see true

For the sea as a gravestone 

rolls constantly over you.

I'm swept up in the furious ocean

that floats past everyday.

All my life it's been that curious 

potion I drink to drift away.

You were the Lady of Shallott

living the visions I brought you.

In that mirror

I was a thin window beside you.

The visions I shadowed 

have shattered inside me.

Now only those fragments 

can reach me so deeply

as did the Lady of Shallott.

c  c/g f  capo 3