Imaginary Martyr
On a lonely gravel, dusty road,
I came to my senses one day,
Looked back toward the city I'd left behind—
Destruction, smoke and decay.
A tear ran down my dusty cheek
As I watched that distant smoke,
My mind was light and my memory thin,
But one thing I surely knew.
There ain't no going home,
There ain't no turning back,
Don't know how I came this far,
Just keep walking down the track.
I'm a martyr of the nth degree,
Dragging these chains that nobody sees,
Paying the price for the things that I lost,
Counting every scar, remembering the cost.
Oh, you can laugh, you can disagree,
But nobody suffers quite like me
I'm a martyr of the nth degree.
With a simple bag, the bag of a bum,
I started down that road,
Mile after mile with nary much style,
Dragging my invisible load.
With an ache in my head and an ache in my heart,
And nowhere I had to be,
I kept asking God, "Where do I go?
Where does the road take me?"
Where to now? Where does it end?
Where in the world do I start?
Funny how a man can walk a thousand miles
And never outrun his heart.
I sat one day beside a lake
To reflect on another life,
A breeze rolled through and scattered my thoughts
Like leaves disappearing from sight.
Thought I might like being a bum or a priest,
A monk might suit me fine,
Maybe a cow, maybe a pig—
It's just a game I play in my mind.
You see, becoming a martyr of the nth degree
Takes sorrow, imagination and pain,
And it's mighty slow going down life's road
When you're dragging your own ball and chain.
I tried to love a girl one time,
She left me drowning in tears,
I guess I'm over her now, though somehow
I can still dilute my beer.
I whispered sweet things in her ear—
Thought romance had finally begun,
She stomped on my feet, punched out my lights,
Then laughed at what she'd done.
A broken heart and a wounded ear,
But at least it helped me face my fear.
Oh, you can balk, you can disagree,
There's always another calamity
When you're a martyr of the nth degree.
To be left alone like a carving in stone
Was a silence I couldn't ignore,
So I packed her up and trundled her off
And changed all the locks on the door.
And if that sounds familiar, well, maybe you've cried
A tear or two... or three,
That's the price and cost of a friend now lost,
And the toll of memory.
For it's me on that road—
And sometimes it's you,
Trudging a dusty mile or two.
Sometimes three, sometimes four,
Asking God what we're put here for.
I've come far enough that I can tell you this:
Life ain't always a pile of bliss.
But I've come far enough that I also can say,
I know my God will provide a way.
Not the easy road,
Not the road I'd choose,
Sometimes you stumble,
Sometimes you lose.
Sometimes faith is nothing more
Than taking one more step
Than you thought you could before.
So I ain't a martyr of the nth degree,
Though sometimes that's how it looks to me,
These chains I've dragged for all these miles
Might've been mine all the while.
There's pain that's real and wounds that stay,
And friends and loves that fade away,
But God ain't finished writing me
There's still some road ahead to see.
So I'll shoulder my bag
And walk another mile,
Maybe someday I'll even smile.
For the martyr I thought I had to be
Was mostly living inside of me.
In my heart and in my dreams the price of imaginary martyrs
