Buttons

In my mind, not enough birds have died
In the shadow of this once cast stone
And I'm not unwell, but I am ill at ease
With all the buttons still left to sew
Through needles eyes
See me sharper than I see myself...

So you should stitch me in to stop me from bleeding

And education can be fickle I think
Sometimes the more you learn
The more you lose a sense of what you think you know
About all the buttons still left to sew
And I'm outside myself more and more these days

So you should stitch my skin to stop me from bleeding
All over this fresh sing and I
Acknowledge all the corners
And all the freshly painted walls, that bear no former scars
Since they're patched up and over now
But I was born of miners and I'm designed to chip away, tunnel in the dark...

But why must it always come down to some unseen contender?
I don't know
When hatchlings all we are
Just battling the whitewash birds above
Sharks below
Though I feel empathy
Towards the ones who threaten me
I'd still leave them soft-shelled to the beaks of crows...

But every now and then a tempest blows
And the veneer I keep comes unsewn
But will you ever read me well?
I can only assume so

And I'm buoyant like a flotsam man
Now relegated by the waves to land
They dry me like a brittle bone
Paraded like a polished stone
And that's what you ought to know

I'd see them smashed on the reefs below