When you were younger, you had nightmares,
you had scissor-pain and phantom limbs
and things that kept you nervous
through that twelve-year interim.
When you fell crossing that street,
south of Houston, old Manhattan land,
those nightmares fell from building-tops
and took you by the hand.
And you were brought into those rooms,
with sliding curtains, shining children's heads.
And one of them, that boy,
was not as lucky as you then.
But he returns to you at night,
just when you think you might have fallen asleep.
His face is up against yours,
and you're too terrified to speak.
Oh, Sylvia,
Oh, Sylvia,
you may think that I'm not listening,
but I am, goddamn, I am.
I won't pretend I understand,
because I can't, and know I never will.
But something makes you sting,
and something makes you want to kill.
It made you crawl under that house,
and stick your head under the stove.
It's all connected in those
complicated nightmares that you wove.
Oh, Sylvia,
Oh, Sylvia,
you may think that I'm not listening,
but I am, goddamn, I am.
