Verse 1

Tap turn on. Water come.
Tap turn off. Water come.
Glasses on the shelf-line filled to the top,
nobody drinkin — tap don't stop.
Next door got a tap. Next door's dog got a tap.
Dog don't ask twice — water don't ask back.
Free at the wall. Free down the hall.
Turn one off — the rest still crawl.

Verse 2

Water in the doormat. Water knee-deep.
Pourman on the corner shiftin spillwater cheap.
Six taps a wall — that's the newbuild spec.
Wallpipes hummin all night, proud of the wet.
River don't look up. Whole street soaked to the garden gnomes.
Old boy still crankin his ropewell, deepdark catacombs —
longhaul on the rope, hand over hand over hand, slow as stone, cold as stone,
and what come up, come up his. Come up old. Come up home.

Verse 3

Doorsteps swellin. Bottom step gone.
Postman rowin his round from dawn.
Windowsills linin up glasses for more.
Rang up to complain — got a jug at the door.
Whole row watchin the level like a soap,
cheerin every inch of it up the rope.
Kids born floaty now. Built for the brine.
Rooftop church on a Sunday — doin fine.
Plate come back full. Full of the same.
Poured out the window. Back where it came.
Man ask the tap for somethin dry.
Tap say sure. Tap don't know why.

Verse 1

Swings at the tide. Tide comes in.
Bucket in the hand. Bucket in the bin.
Wave gets tall. Salt in the teeth.
Sand going out from under the feet.

Verse 2

Built a wall. Wall went soft.
Nailed a sign to the sea. Sign came off.
Called the tide a thief. Called the tide a fraud.
Tide come in. Tide come in. Tide come in. Lord.

Verse 3

Arms gone heavy. Coat gone black.
Every bucket he throws comes back.
Shouting at the swell with a mouth half full.
Sea don't argue. Sea don't pull.

Verse 1

Slide four's a rocket and slide five's a hockey stick and the man behind the laptop's got a ring light and a mic,
and the room goes ooh and the room goes ah and somebody in the back says brilliant and nobody asks what for,
and the lights are hot and the coffee's cold and the water's in a jug and the jug's got a lemon in and nobody's drinking it at all,
and next week it's a mug, and the week after it's a wall, and the week after that it's furniture and nobody sees it fall.

Verse 2

Half a life in a basement and he's up there like a prophet with a laser pen and a bottle of still water,
dry mouth, chin up, hands going, ring tapping on the table like a horse that's learned to count,
and the back row's nodding at the ceiling and the ceiling's got a light in and the light's got a fly in,
and you ask the one thing, and he turns the record over, wets his lips and says: we'll be right back.

Verse 1

Learned the path. Not the chair.
Twenty years. Every stair.
Kept the key. Cut the fee.
Sold the seat. Never sat. See.
Hinge gives. No bang. Click.
Gate flat. Feet on it. Quick.
Outside now. Nothing to guard.
Badge still on. Neck red. Shout Hard.

Verse 2

Wrote a letter. Open. Signed.
Nine hundred names. Same kind.
Chair-chasers. Badge. Path.
Nod at the letter. Letter did the math.
Made it moral. Made it law.
Priest. Pulpit. Printout. Jaw.
Spit on the mic. Spit on the sleeve.
Spit's the only thing they leave.

Verse 3

No gate. Never had one. Never owned.
No key. No queue. No throne.
Nothing to guard so nothing to lose.
Sky went grey. Said weather. Kept moving. No news.
No letter. No names. No law.
No pulpit. No printout. No jaw.
Room never nodded. Room never knew.
Room's still nodding. Nothing to nod to.

Verse 1

Can make a face.
Cannot make it old.
Can make a voice.
Cannot make it cold.

Can hold the hours.
Cannot make them mine.
Can hold the table.
Cannot hold the line.

Verse 2

Can find the word.
Cannot make it hurt.
Can wear the coat.
Cannot wear the dirt.

Machine Sure! Here's —

Can wait all night.
Cannot get it wrong.
Can start again.
Cannot want it gone.

Verse 1

Two tribes running, same road, opposite ends of the track,
one lot breathless forward, one lot breathless back —
stacking up the numbers, bending over at the output shrine,
both never look down and clock the shifted, vanished line.

Verse 2

When the making costs nothing then the made thing's worth the same —
the memo, the mock-up, the anthem, done before you name the name.
So they tune the pixel, tighten up the funnel, work the grind,
sprint harder at a ribbon that's a mile back down the line.

Verse 3

A point of view that cost you fifteen years of being yourself,
the thing you made for one person, never lifted off the shelf,
a face that's actually been somewhere, a voice that earned its rest,
the choosing not to show it — the one thing it can't guess.

Verse 1

Ten years going. Ten years barking at the moving van.
Dog's got nothing.
Dogs got nothing cos the van stopped fam!
Now she's found a voice. Now she's found a cause.
Now she's got a thread and a round of applause.
Diddly-widdly, whoopsie, look who grew a spine.
Found it in the comments. Right below her affiliate line.

Verse 2

Grasping at a straw, grasping at a stick,
grasping at a rake, grasping at a .......
"Dangerous," she whimpers through the botox,
'cause it read her funnel and it said: that's a box.
Turd munchers hawking anti-robot tees,
forty quid to tell you what your art should be.
Ain't scared of the robot eating grandma,
scared it does the thing they charge you for, for nada.

Verse 1

Ring ring. It's your brush. Got a minute? Won't be long.
Heard you want to paint. I can do you the whole song.
Guide before the place. Map before the street.
Café before you sit. Seat before the seat.
Read it, watched it, routed it, booked it, arrived.
Knew it all already. Nothing got in. Survived.
Went. Didn't travel. Plane is not a trip.
Got the photos. Got the fridge magnet. Deleted. Skip.

Verse 2

Bristle-botherers on the line all day.
Course on spontaneity. Retreat on letting go.
"Pay."
Hour-long video: how to be like me.
Then the price came off. Now the whole thing's free.
Pay with the watch. Pay with the thumb. Pay with the stare.
Walk off with nothing. Feel like you've actually been there.
Only thing required was even never mine to sell.
Go. Not know. Let it roll. Oh well.

Verse 1

Set the stall up first. Best pitch on the row.
Turn it up.
Turn it up.
Nothing on the table. Nothing to show.

Verse 2

Hoarse by ten, and the tea's gone stone cold.
Shouting at the same three men.
Shouting at the same three men.
Shouting 'til the shout is old.

Verse 1

Made the bed and got a star.
Brushed the teeth and got a star.
Didn't know what the bed was for.
Stuck it on the fridge. Want more.

Verse 2

Got a robot for the bed.
Got a robot for the peas.
Robot got the stars instead.
Fridge is shining. Nobody sees.

Verse 1

Yeah, the lab coat and the saffron robe both wriggled into your feed, you know —
coat never cut the carbs, robe just posted it from the peak before, and so
the scroller got muddled, mesmerised, buttoned to the caption and quote,
tailored, tucked, and appropriate — forgot the breathing body under the throat.

Verse 2

Ah, the coat clips crisp where the charts stack square, you feel —
robe is the mumbling, the humming wound round the raw, never the meal, for real.
Breakfast, bus stop, bathroom queue — same wet thumb swipes the tile,
teaching the feeling to nuzzle a north somebody posted with a smile.

Verse 3

One more tab on the laptop patches the hole the laptop tore —
so they thumb the screen, they book the tour, they bang the same barred door.
One boot in the lab coat, one boot braced in the robe, and hold —
not a truce — splits in the kitchen, lowkey, deadass, getting old.

Verse 1

Yeah, top and bottom share a secret, both live outside the school, you know —
poor never got it, rich never needed the rule, and so
the middle got the full dose, carries it, can't set it down,
learned what's appropriate, safe, unsaid, and lost which way was down.

Verse 2

Ah, real moves happen at the poles — the art, the turn, the spark, you feel —
middle observes, the middle comments — the note, the nod, the mark, for real.
School, then office, then the feed, every layer the same con:
teaching the outsourcing of the one compass they'd lean on.

Verse 3

One more credential fixes what the credentials made —
so they panic, regulate, buy the course, parade.
One foot in and one foot out — not a lean, not a fold,
a practice, a capacity, daily, and never sold.

Verse 4

Ay, the vapour's coming for the middle of every trade, you know —
hmm, sure

Verse 5

Everyone selling opens the same. Most people are doing it wrong.
Thousands of them, each the exception, each certain, all along.
The only difference here — there's nothing at the end to sell.

Verse 6

Phone in the pocket, body underfoot, knowing which the moment calls, you know —
fully in the wetware, fully fluent in the thing, through all the falls, and so.