The Man I Knew

By the time that you told me it was already plain that you'd changed
But your conscience was clean and as white as a line of cocaine
My back to the wall of your bedroom apartment
You're talking in circles, got two cigarettes burning

And I couldn't hide how afraid I was to see you so strange
Don't get me wrong, I've got no ill will for you
It'd just been so long, I thought I'd always know you
But you're so far gone

Up where the air gets thin...
You cut the kite strings
I've seen my name in lights, I've seen my face in papers
But my civilian life, I spent ten good years waiting
Waiting for you

You charmed the snake
You picked the card
You bent the spoon
A curved plane, the shapes change

Euclid's made to play the fool, but
I don't know what that stuff does to you
And I don't know if it's real, but
I spent a decade in love with you
And I just can't tell if you're here, cause

[Hook]
The man I knew
I don't think that he can hear me now
So dizzy with the altitude
It's just too far
Who am I to tell you to come down?

Lucky that my palate still prefers a legal poison
Who am I to tell you to come down?
Sit back and raise a glass, a glass to easy choices
Who am I, yeah, who am I, yeah who am I
To tell you to come down?

[Hook]

Last night you came to kiss me in a dream and when I woke
What kind of foolishness is this
Breathed out a lungful of your smoke

I've seen you at your brightest
What a mind, let it burn
Who am I to pull you down to Earth?

Yeah, who am I to tell you to come down?