L'Éponge

Lyrics

[Intro]

[Verse 1]
You see me pause at the doorway.
It is not shyness. It is... inventory.
The way the light from the window cuts the dust.
The low hum of the cooler behind the bar, a perfect G sharp.
The slight scratch of the linen napkin on my wrist.
My own heart, a little too fast.
I am just... taking it in. All of it. Before I sit.

[Chorus]
You say I am too sensitive.
A beautiful word for a body with no skin.
Every sound, a stone dropped in a still pond.
Every glance, a change in the weather.
This is not a choice.
It is the only way the world arrives.
A flood. And I am the sponge.
L'éponge.

[Verse 2]
Then the room fills.
The scrape of a chair on the tile, a violin string snapping.
The clatter of spoons against porcelain.
Her perfume, gardenia, wrestling with his Gauloises smoke.
That tag on my sweater, a single insistent tooth against my neck.
And the lights... oh, the fluorescent lights.
They don't just hum. They scream. A silent, flickering scream.
And I hear it all.

[Chorus]
You say I am too sensitive.
A kind word for a body with no walls.
Every sound, a stone dropped in a still pond.
Every scent, a story I didn't ask to read.
This is not a choice.
It is the only way the world arrives.
A flood. And I am the sponge.
L'éponge.

[Bridge]
And then it comes. The wave.
The thousand conversations become one roaring noise.
A thousand tiny needles on my skin.
A headache blooming behind my eyes like a dark flower.
Someone, a woman in California, gave this a name in 1996.
She put it in a book.
She said it was not a flaw, but a design.
A design for what? This drowning?

[Outro]
So I find the quiet corner.
I close my eyes.
The sponge... squeezes itself out. Drip by drip.
Until it is just damp.
And light enough.
To wait for the next rain.