Broken Cup - Jason Webley

Well the swing set is rusted

The picture frame’s cracked

The photos have all faded to gray

The faces you trusted

Just never came back

Yes childhood has eroded away

And the songs that your mother sang

As she rocked you to sleep

You howl out of tune when you’re drunk

Wear good shoes on these streets

Or you’ll soon cut your feet

On a piece of the broken cup

After so many Johns and Janes

Have stained your sheets

Is it habit or thirst brings them back?

After so many pipers

Have played on these streets

Who is missed more, the children or the rats?

Yes we’ve traded our toy choo-choo trains

And rosary beads

For a bottle of gin and a fuck

Now we sit 'round the bar

Proud of how bored we are

As we drink from our broken cup

We sing, «everything, everything, everything

Is now permitted

All the oaths we’ve taken

Have been graciously forgotten

And every sin, every sin

Is now forgiven.»

And every sip somehow tastes rotten

So let’s drink to the men

Who forgot what they lost

They’ve got the best shoes that money can buy

And a toast to our impotence

Our cowardice, our sloth

Nothing matters, why bother to try?

And three cheers for Mary

Our virgin, our whore

If she favors you, it’s just dumb luck

Now I’ll lift up my glass

To a life on our ass

Brothers, lift your cup high

While your waiting to die

May we all find a trace

A faint echo of grace

Through the crack in our broken cup