From Here Till Utopia

Well, I’m afraid that the circles I’ve been drinking myself in

Aren’t big enough for the vowels that

I try to fit inside of them

When I was young, I drank too much, and I’d be lying if I said

I didn’t feel so goddamn young tonight

Maybe too young to ask what’s on my mind

Like if freedom means doing what I want

Well, don’t I gotta want something?

And won’t you tell me that we want something more than just more beer?

And my friends, if that ain’t true, won’t you lie to me tonight?

Well, I’ve been listening to Minor Threat records all day

And shit if I do not know every word

I sing along as I tie off

And Ian screams he’s “Out of Step”

As I throw the cotton into the spoon, draw up into the syringe

I’ll know just what he means until I hit a vein

But after that I won’t have to bother with knowing who I am

For a while at least

In a moment the whole world is gonna melt around me

And I’ll swear I don’t miss it as a I lie to you tonight

Because I’m afraid to look the world in the eye

If nothing’s gonna change, well, then I’d rather die

And I’m too unemployed to organize a union

I’m too intoxicated to tear down a building

I’m too hopeless to look for a solution, I’m afraid that if I found one

I’d be out of excuses for the way

I waste away in the gutters that I chose

Like fashion accessories to go with my dirty clothes

I haven’t bathed in months, but you know it’s not because

I’ve been fighting bourgeois morals, I’m just lazy and I’m young

I’ve seen the best minds of my generation

Dying drunk or high from the rooftops to the parking lots

Stomped to death in west Philadelphian squats

They’ve got me waiting on a day when we can say “fuck the police!”

With a little bit of integrity

When it will mean: “I’ve got your back if you’ve got mine!”

Give me a scene where I believe in more

Than bad hair cuts, guilt, and misery

I don’t know where I fit between the vegans and the nihilists

That might be the first thing I’ve said that wasn’t a lie tonight

Because there’s gotta be something more

Than lying in the front yard, naked, screaming at the constellations

I want something more than an apology to say

When I look the world in the eye

I’ll tell you, man, my friend William came to me with a message of hope

It went: “Fuck you and everything that you think you know

If you don’t step outside the things that you believe

They’re gonna kill you.”

He said: “No one’s gonna stop you from dying young, and miserable, and right

If you want something better, you gotta put that shit aside.”

I thought about how for thousands of years

There have been people who told us that things can’t go on like this

From Jesus Christ to the diggers, from Malthus to Zerzan

From Karl Marx to Huey Newton

But the shit goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on

On and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on

Now, I’m not saying that we can’t change the world

'Cause everybody does at least a little bit of that

But I won’t shit myself, the way I’m living is a temper tantrum and I

Need something else, need something else, need something else to stay alive

And on the night that I play my last show, I’ll be

Singing so loud that my heart explodes

And I’ll be singing, I’ll be singing: 'We are free!'

Oh, but won’t you promise me that we won’t ever

Forget what the means?

I know it’s hard to give a shit sometimes, but promise me we’ll always try

'Cause I don’t wanna hate you, and I don’t wanna hate me

And I don’t wanna have to hate everything anymore