Lonely by Design

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[Verse 1] Marcus Woods keeps a medal in a kitchen drawer Next to unpaid bills and a rusted screwdriver He tells the boys at Murphy’s he crossed some foreign shore But the dates don’t match, and the stories change by supper He learned that folks will listen when a uniform is near So he wears one in his talking, though he never wore it there Every borrowed battle buys him one more round of beer And one more little kingdom made of strangers’ open ears [Chorus] Marcus, you keep building walls from every hand you bite Then wonder why the porch stays empty every night You say, “Nobody knows me,” with your knuckles on the door But you’ve spent every welcome that you ever had before Oh Marcus Woods, you’re lonely by design Still looking for a witness at the end of the line [Verse 2] His pension disappears in liquor, cards, and pills A week before the check comes, he’s bargaining for thrills He calls it living hard; the landlord calls it late The mirror calls him older every morning at eight When he’s sober, he’s a blade with somebody’s name The waitress keeps his coffee but won’t stay for the blame He can turn a birthday toast into a courtroom flame Then sit alone at closing, cursing friends who never came [Chorus] Marcus, you keep building walls from every hand you bite Then wonder why the porch stays empty every night You say, “Nobody knows me,” with your knuckles on the door But you’ve spent every welcome that you ever had before Oh Marcus Woods, you’re lonely by design Still looking for a witness at the end of the line [Bridge] There’s a photograph of Marcus as a boy beside a creek Before he learned that being loud could hide the way you ache Maybe all he ever wanted was somebody saying, “Stay” But he mistook a made-up war for a reason to be seen [Final Chorus] Marcus, you keep building walls, but your hands are tired now No one left to argue with, no one left to tell you how You say, “I’ve got no friends,” and the old room answers true Then the silence takes a chair and sits down next to you Oh Marcus Woods, if you lay the armor down There might still be one kind heart in this worn-out town [Outro] The medal stays in the drawer, the bottle by the bed Tomorrow he may tell the truth—or tell the lie again