She said, “I always hurt everyone I want to help.
When it’s all said and done, I’ll be by myself.
I tried to be the peacemaker and started the whole war;
I decided to face my maker, he said I got what I deserved.

You say you feel trapped, don’t know how to get out.
Well throw out your map, that’s not what it’s about.
But I can’t help you, all I’ve ever done is escape.
I run when I get boxed in; I run so I don’t break.
I’m pulled into the cold without time to shiver,
Like a willow ripped from the banks of the river.
I sleep on the rocks, my prison yard bed;
No too soft pillow for this too hard head.

You said, “I love to see you here, that light comes back in your eyes.”
Well, the snow falls down, the cold wakes me up, and I feel alive.
In the woods there is peace; I know the trees can help me climb any slope.
Inner and outer, observer and observed, it all intermingles like sorrow and hope.
I wish I could feel the same way outside, but I never do.
So I return to the empty places to be restored and reborn.
I need these places as much as I need to live and to move.
For no one has died or is dying, yet I grieve and I mourn.

She said, “I always hurt everyone I want to help.
I can’t get past the first step, and I’m s’posed to do twelve?”
She said, “I’m limited by a world whose ambitions I do not share.”
I said, “No, you’re freed by that perception: free to yearn, to burn, to care.”
She said, “I guess I’m still a little bit fearful.
I confess I might not have what it takes.
I was told that what I lack is experience.
What I want back is life for life’s sake.”

She said, “You run so you don’t break,
But when I find you, you look shattered.”
I countered with some nonsense about how
To be healed you must first be torn and in tatters,
And how I’d rather be poor and miserable
Than one of the contented mob.
She said, “If you’re trying to find what’s integral,
You’re doing a demented job.”

The pianist strikes a melancholy chord,
As I wait in vain for the knock on the door,
To bring me the love I can never deserve,
And something to fix me that won’t hurt me more.

But there’s no quick fix, no magic contentment pill,
Nothing that satisfies, no easy way to feel fulfilled.
So I’ll wander and roam, like I always do.
Maybe I’ll find a home, maybe you will too.