Steam

Well, let me set the mood

See I'm back in the bar in the same dusty room

Where if I try bust a move there's no one to view

There's no other punters so no attitude

The barman stares vacantly like he's been lost in a crossword for the last eighteen weeks

Where every minute is a month's length of time

Did it stand still here it never was spent

The same mahogany backdrop

Me I'm deep in the laptop

See I dashed from the lab spot

Needed peace and look what that's brought

Melancholy on the jazz piano emanating from a radio emitting static crackle

The sound of a lonely flight's wings seems to disrupt the atmosphere causing all kinds of din

I stare up at the web-ridden ceiling and spy on arachnids to try gauge their feelings

I try and engage my breathing the walls of this hovel contracting and deepening

Tobacco and ale stains that linger on long since the last guest disengaged

It's got me thinking is this a grave the hollow gaze of the barman rocking the pale face

And I think to myself that I should interact with this shell of a man but I won't

He's probably got problems I'll never know

Probably can't solve them and cannot cope

Probably would hang if he had the rope on a tripwire

Clubfooted with a broken hope on a last ever lost child from a broken home

Lost the last race with a smile etched on his dome

I'm like hell I know the feeling

I've been low but I never once gave up on the reading

And I've grown because I'm reeling off the grievances

And dealing with the sadness of a past that's long forgotten like the summer season

I'm thinking better on my curiosity

I reach inside my pocket for a tip to hand him I should leave

He looks to me and says that I should stay

Sit down and have another beer on him I feel obliged to have to say

So this weather the small talk is automatic

Cut me to the taste but interjecting with the rites of passage

I feel the time overlapping

Drowsy now my eyes are heavy and the bottom jaw is slacking

As I slip from the stool to a heap on the floor

He reaches for the fire axe propped by the door

From the glint on the blade the last thing I see is the smile on his face and I'm gone