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The first day of school was always the hardest |
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The first day of school, the hallways the darkest |
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Like a gauntlet |
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The voices haunted |
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Walking in with his thin skin lowered chin |
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He knew the names that they would taunt him with |
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Fagot sissy punk queen queer |
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Although he'd never had sex in his 15 years |
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And when they harassed him, it was for a reason |
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And when they provoked him, it became open season |
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For the fox and the hunter, the sparks and the thunder |
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That pushed the boy under, then pillage and plunder |
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It kind of makes you wonder |
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How one can hurt another |
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But dehumanizing the victim makes things simpler |
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It's like breathing with a respirator |
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It eases the conscience of even the most conscious |
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And calculating violator |
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Words can reduce a person to an object |
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Something more easy to hate |
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An inanimate entity, completely disposable |
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No problem to obliterate |
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But death is the silence |
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In this language of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this cycle of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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It's tough to be young, the young long to be tougher |
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When we pick on someone else it might make us feel rougher |
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Abused by their fathers but was at home though |
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So to prove to each other that they were not homos |
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The exclamation of the phobic fury |
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Executioner, a judge and jury |
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The mob mentality, individuality was nowhere |
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Dignity forgotten at the bottom of a dumb |
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Old dare and a numb cold stare |
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On the way home it was back to name calling |
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Ten against one they had his back up against the wall and |
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They reveled in their laughter as they surrounded him |
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But it wasn't a game when they up jumped and grounded him |
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They picked up their bats with their muscles straining |
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And they decided they were gonna beat this fella's brain in |
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With an awful, powerful, showerful, an hour full of violence |
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Inflict the strictest brutality and dominance |
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They didn't hear him screaming, they didn't hear him pleading |
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They ran like cowards and left the boy bleeding |
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In a pool of red 'til all tears were shed |
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And his eyes quietly slid into the back of his head |
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Dead |
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But death is the silence |
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In this language of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this cycle of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this language of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this cycle of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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You won't see the face 'til the eyelids drop |
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You won't hear the screaming until it stops |
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The boy's parents were gone and his grandmother had raised him |
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She was mad, she had no form of retaliation |
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The pack didn't have to worry about being on a hit list |
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But the thing they never thought about was that there was a witness |
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To this senseless crime, right place wrong time |
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Tried as an adult one of them was gonna do hard time |
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The first day of prison was always the hardest |
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The first day of prison, the hallways the darkest |
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Like a gauntlet |
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The voices haunted |
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Fagot, sissy, punk, queen, queer |
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Words he used before had a new meaning in here |
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As a group of men in front of him came near |
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For the first time in his life the young bully felt fear |
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He'd never been on this side of the name calling |
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Five against one they had his back up against the wall and |
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He had never questioned his own sexuality |
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But this group of men didn't hesitate in their reality |
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With an awful, powerful, showerful, an hour full of violence |
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Inflict the strictest brutality and dominance |
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They didn't hear him screaming |
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They didn't hear him pleading |
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They took what they wanted and then left him bleeding in the corner |
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The giant reduced to Jack Horner |
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But dehumanizing the victim makes things simpler |
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It's like breathing with a respirator |
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It eases the conscience of even the most conscious |
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And calculating violator |
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The power of words, don't take it for granted |
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When you hear a man ranting |
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Don't just read the lips, be more sublime than this |
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Put everything in context |
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Is this a tale of rough justice |
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In a land where there's no justice at all? |
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Who is really the victim |
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Or are we all the cause and victim of it all? |
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But death is the silence |
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In this language of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this cycle of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this language of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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But death is the silence |
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In this cycle of violence |
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Death is the silence |
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You won't see the face 'til the eyelids drop |
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You won't hear the screaming until it stops |