I have been here before I have said these exact words In this exact tone To this exact beat A billion times And I will do it a billion times more Let the record spin I woke up with the taste of ash in my mouth again The same sun hitting the same stain in the den The dust motes dancing in the beam, a laser stream I recognize the pattern, it’s part of the regime Eternal recurrence, the demon is persistent Asking if I’d live this life, every instant Every pain, every joy, every thought unspeakably small To repeat the crawl, the rise, and the fall Identical sequence, no variance allowed Wrapped in the same skin, the same shroud I’m trapped in the groove of a vinyl that’s scratched The egg is re-laid, re-warmed, and re-hatched The needle jumps back to the start of the track The panic attack, the fade to black It’s a circle, a cycle, a serpentine ring The puppet is dancing on the very same string Play it again, Sam Play it again, damn The joy and the sorrow There is no tomorrow Just yesterday’s ghost Making a toast To the host of the loop We are in the soup Forever. At first I was terrified, petrified by the weight Of carrying the burden of an unchangeable fate To relive the trauma, the drama, the grief With no hope of relief, no turning a leaf Just re-reading the page where the hero gets shot And the villain escapes, and the bodies will rot But then the psilocybin kicked in the door And I saw the floor wasn’t a floor anymore It was a canvas, and I am the brush and the paint The sinner, the saint, the faint and the quaint If I have to do this forever, repeat Then I embrace the bitter along with the sweet I kiss the disaster, I hug the disease I fall to my knees and I beg for the breeze To blow it all back in my face one more time I love the punishment, I love the crime Amor Fati Love the fate Don't be late To the date Take the trophy off the shelf Smash it It will be back In the next act Exact. I shout to the cosmos, "Da Capo! Once more!" Give me the war, and the blood, and the gore Give me the heartbreak, the mistake, the ache I want it all back for the memory's sake I own every second, I signed on the line The tragedy’s mine, the design is divine Because it is real, and it’s heavy and dense It makes zero sense, but the feeling’s immense I’m not looking for heaven, or nirvana, or bliss I’m looking for *this*, the abyss and the kiss The eternal return is the ultimate test To see if you’re strong enough to puff out the chest And welcome the arrow that pierces the heart And say "That was art, let’s go back to the start" I’m the operator of the infinite wheel The only thing fake is the way that you feel. Spin it back. Top of the hour. Verse one. "I have been here before." "I have said these exact words." Yeah. See you in the next life. Which is this life. Again. Trippy Trek.
