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Modern Grotesque

by Dreamwell

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1.
The beating. The shaking. The thing carved in bones. The thing that washed up and brings plague to your home. The burning. The rusted. The blower of horns. The porcelain girl who must burden its scorn. The thing that sleeps and moans in the choir. The thing that awakens when the sun is devoured. It's hate and it's sorrow, its smile bleeds when it cracks. This is the martyr. The modern grotesque.
2.
I've been painting shadows on the wall with the light of the time that I've been burning to get my life in order. Always moving. Always on the verge of breaking. Sometimes I need the silence and the stillness of an empty place. Sometimes, I don't have what it takes to be near another. I need space to not think. I don't mean to make you feel like I don't care about the precious moments when our time intersects. I'm just nervous for the future. Exhausted by the present. Hands are shaking and always on the verge of beating myself into the ground where I can get some sleep. I'm so desperate for sleep. Dark days, I need to be alone. I have nothing to offer but disjointed spaces. I have nothing to offer but these withered limbs. My heart still beats even when I'm motionless. I'm so sorry I've been distant from your side. From your life. From your love. I don't want to be like this anymore.
3.
Sayaka 04:21
Keep a close watch on his face. Search for any sign of life. What pretty poetry all the nihilists would write if they could look in his eyes. Have you ever known a man to hold an abyss in his hands? I wish you could hear his voice. You would know that he’s not far. Would you still be there when he pushes you away? I think that you will be. You never had the strength to walk away. Weeping like a mute stone. Singing like a stuffed bird. Lying like a snake in the garden, and hiding like a savior. I need someone to believe in. I need someone to deceive. I need someone to believe in. I need someone to betray. If I cannot feel then I cannot be loved. I will march throughout all of your lashings. You can't hurt a person if their body is empty. I'm a porcelain doll; I am fragile but lifeless. If I cannot feel then I cannot be loved, and if I cannot feel then I cannot be stopped. I won't feel anything anymore.
4.
What is the sound that creeps through my window as I try to sleep? What does your voice sound like when it’s being carried by the wind? I've been catching fragments. You’ve been getting dark. Sometimes I hope this emptiness, this nothing that I feel, is a sign that you don't think of me anymore. Can you feel it when I think of you? I've known you too long to have just forgotten the words to your song, so why can't I hear it sung on the breeze? I could pick your voice out from a choir of everybody's prayers but mine, so why can't I remember the way that you sounded back when you told me you loved me? I can't hear your voice if I cannot see your face. I don't want you to know what I've been thinking. I've been thinking things are better when I'm gone.
5.
A crown of thorns adorned your head, but your blood tasted like iron and not the wine you wished you bled. I did everything I could to not learn anything from you but how to be a martyr. I must have taken part in the violence. I can't have only been a victim. I must have guided the hand that broke me. I was shaped by abuse, now I'm the vermin son. Your teeth aren't the only part of you in my veins. This anxiety’s a black stone you vomited out when you swallowed your children. You must have engraved the worst parts of you in my bones. I'm some sick attempt to reverberate the evils that you have sewn into your home. I don't hate you anymore, because if I did, that would mean that I still think of you at all.
6.
Surrounded by places unknown, lit by suns that burn too dim. The sky is blotted out by smoke. Locusts have eaten the north star. Home is somewhere long forgotten, but it once was here. There is nowhere blight can’t touch. There must be somewhere that I can breathe. Lungs expand with burning here, but it’s all I see. If love can be a sin, then may all of man be turned into a mountain of salt. Let the wounds in our hands burn as we ascend. May the pain remind us all of the power that we all have to pull our masters down by chains. Sin is the burden that we must bear. The sin of those who took our love away. I will always look back.
7.
8.
The man who held my mind for me died the other day. He sailed a burning ship toward moonlight reflected on the water, but never got close enough to swim in pallid lunar tides, so he just drowned. And the saddest thing about him is that he's part of me forever by my hands. And the saddest thing about him is that he's part of me in more than just the honor of his name. I let him search for what he could never find. I let him sink, I left him behind. Or so I thought. But then he washed up on shore, a corpse in heart alone. His face was made of glass. The vision of apathy breathing. Kiss me one more time before I fall into pitch cold darkness. One day I will never move again, but make no mistake. My chest will still rise with shallow breath, though the gloss in my eyes will mimic death. After all, I am him, this pitiful thing I made that can only feel safe drowning in empty space. I will be alone. I will find a way to make you hate me. I will push you away. I will burn down our home. I will find a way to make you hate me. It’s in my blood. It's in my bones. I will find a way to make you hate me. I will be alone.
9.
Noble preacher of the cardboard pulpit, your sermon will be worshipped by rats. Broken bottles pull blood from your gums, and I want to taste Christ when we kiss. “I'm a drifter who’s wandered through shafts of light. I am hunted by the sound of trumpets bellowing over the hills. Maybe I wasn’t speaking clearly enough,” he said. “some things were never meant to be seen by lowly man.” His eyelids were painted black. “I am but clay and I am shaped by the words etched in my skull. Maybe if I split myself wide open, even you could believe the things I've seen. Sinner, believe in what I’ve seen. I've seen the face of the creator, and I fear his hunger, his teeth. What sort of fool would refuse to believe?” He stood illuminated by the fire in the barrel. What was he burning there? The air was thick with the stench of meat and hair. He raised his hand up to the clouds. The smoke clung to him in a shroud. A shard of glass glimmered in the fleeting rays of sun. Then he brought it down, hard and fast between his ribs. One swift shot to the ribs. He raised his hand again to touch the face of God. He just kept plunging downward and downward. Two in the hands, one in the feet, then one in his throat. Five holy wounds. The blood, how it flowed. The martyr, the modern grotesque.
10.
I haven't got any promises left. I'm all out of hopeful words to give. I must admit, I've been suffering so long that I've run out of eloquent ways to express it. There’s something to be said about the way we learn to die. Finality as an enemy instead of a chance to start again. There's something to be said about an end. A peaceful end. I'm looking for something new in my life. Something more worth shouting into the light. But if I don’t have sorrow, all I have is hatred. And I think the world has enough of that. Show me a god who doesn't spill blood, and I'll show you a rusted machine. But I’ll still hold out hope for some wounded seraph, some sickly angel to learn compassion in her final days. If, when I die, it all should start again, I'll pray the next time’s a smaller hell. So let the spirit cycle down, and watch a smile crack the face.

about

the cursed album

credits

released February 26, 2021

Dreamwell is:

Keziah Staska - Vocals, lyrics
Ryan Couitt - Guitars, additional vocals
Aki McCullough - Guitars, additional vocals
Justin Soares - Bass
Anthony Montalbano - Drums

Engineered & mixed by Ryan Stack @ Format Audio/The Noise Floor
Additional guitar engineering by Aki McCullough @ Nu House Studios
Mastered by Adam Cichocki @ Timber Studios

Original art by Janelle Choiniere
Design & Photography by Jared Shute

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Dreamwell Providence, Rhode Island

emo post skramz from Providence, RI.

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