It’s near impossible to hunt when you don’t know the prey 
Or shake that tracker on your heels, hounding every day
He’s silent and by god he’s swift, made a home in your den
Lyin’ poised while your eyes drift, it’s not an if but a when
Barely risen from your slumber, your lumbered in tatters
A brittle bargain-bin baron, barren all that matters
You bear only vigor and scorn for those you preach as close
Off mercy you have duly sworn, a baby in wolves’ clothes
From a scary, thoughtless savage, in his attire you’ve adorned
But every child knows the adage, a fronting man best ignored
Grown a cast-awayed cliche, an unwitting trope engrossed
Into believing we’d obey a parasitic host!

You think you wanna teach?
There’s nothing to be taught
You’re dangerous to reach
Fury’s all you’ve wrought
Just more subverted speech 
Without even a thought
For the growth that you leech
A shoulder’s all we sought

So where’s the tender hero
Or a harmless model maybe
Because all I’ve known’s a foe
Cast from the family tree 

If I branch out I’m in danger, turned on, I flipped the switch
Are they absent or in liquor? I would never know which
It’s fortitude, a name preferred, mouth trained and sealed shut
And where your purposes once were, lies a foul, septic gut
Yanked away from your mother’s arms, to coddle is to wound
Attention only causes harm, fragility balloons
You’d never sit by and idly watch, your son get labeled
You turn the violence up a notch, mood shifts to unstable 
A fist is better than a chest, don’t let him cry it out
Humiliation cannot rest, we must remain devout
Beat him down and don’t let him rise, until he sees the way
Get the fuck up and dry those eyes, this is the role you’ll play

And for that fist I’m pissed
Misery’s all it stirs
For a mentor I wished
Received a saboteur
Your hostile actions cause
The opposite effect
And with your fangs and claws
My promise you have wrecked

So where’s the tender hero
Or a harmless model maybe
Because all I’ve known’s a foe
Cast from the family tree 

It’s all too late to fix
The damage has been done
I’ll rebuild brick by brick
The pain can’t be outrun
I will finish the task
You were afraid to complete
I’ll surrender the mask
Your power won’t repeat

Your power won’t repeat
Your power won’t repeat
Your power won’t repeat

So where’s the tender hero
Or a harmless model maybe
Because all I’ve known’s a foe,l
Cast from the family tree 

I cannot be and I will not be the example that you set
The anguish and confusion in me, I won’t soon forget

I cannot be and I will not be the example that you set
The anguish and confusion in me, I won’t soon forget

Tender Hero

Spike

Veronica

The Dream Academy

Life in a Northern Town

Pretenders II

Message of Love

The Singles

Back on the Chain Gang

Into the Gap

Hold Me Now

What Do All The People Know The Monroes

What Do All The People Know The Monroes

Chesterthefrog

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