Already Gone

Page by page of black and white cartoons

I kept ‘em by my bed in a cardboard box

I read ‘em one by one on summer afternoons

Lonely upstairs with all the ticking clocks

And you were elsewhere like you always were

Until you tumbled in to make a scene

And then you came in, raised your gavel up

Ladies and gentlemen, let the court convene

All these years, I been keeping it light

Tryin’ to make it all right, put up a good fight

But now I’m thinking that I knew all along about it

And how that farewell that I wanted to come

Was never gonna come. How could I have been so dumb?

When I tried to find you, you were already gone

Brick by brick, I found my own way to be

To fashion something like a landing strip

I always said you helped me get to my feet

I never noticed how you tried to trip me

Instead you tripped, yourself, and like a rolling wave

You had to crash into the waiting shore

And you just lay there, battered by the sea

Completely spent and then you paid some more

I saw you as a hero and a hero gets enshrined in a place on high

So when I picked you up at destination zero,

I should have told that hero goodbye

I could never bring myself to that,

But maybe now the time has come