Northern Fires (Guernica)

Ration my breath, terror clandestine in my chest
 Mangled, I lay on a foreign forest floor
 Caught in an instant, divided by distance
 Alone in the fray, clutching my trigger, I pray
 As I make amends with death on a distant shore
 Such is the fate of the nation-state, despite the myths they propagate
 The narrative never fits the crime
 Democracy's died this death a thousand times
 The masses kneel before the golden cross
 Held by the priest who bows at the feet of the king
 We stand alone in the dust of what could be
 Fighting to find our humanity
 Bury me with my name in an unmarked grave
 Another casualty to the vanity of history
 The war marches on after the killing ends
 Take our lives, colonize our minds
 I've been digging through timelines, historical bylines
 I find the fatal flaw in our design lies
 Between thoughts we had and words we knew
 Between what we're told and what is true
 Who fuels the fascist? A classist, inculcating the masses in passes
 Under the contrived countenance of contrition
 The victor writes the story, more often burns the manuscript
 Set fire to a pyre, cremate the crimes that they commit
 But the flames kept us warm so we bit our tongues and tasted scorn
 The bitter stench of finite men
 Betrayed by the thieves they swore to defend
 The bell will toll, and in the end
 Lay only echoes of what could have been
 We stand alone in the dust of what could be
 Fighting to find our humanity
 We stand alone in the dust of what could be
 Nothing we fought for will set us free
 Throw myself, headlong, to the jaws of the beast
 The war machine that feeds for eternity
 Throw myself, headlong, to the jaws of the beast
 The war machine that turns for eternity
 Throw myself, headlong, to the jaws of the beast
 The war machine that feeds for eternity
 Throw myself, headlong, to the jaws of the beast
 The war machine that turns for eternity