Moses Sumney
Bystanders
[Verse 1]
Oh
You wanna strip away
Veracity is great
But you'll bleed
And all
For a lukewarm embrace
You serrate your face
With glee

[Chorus]
Don't waste your candor
On bystanders
They'll watch you waste, waste, waste, waste away

[Verse 2]
What's the use of confessing the truth
To an executioner in a booth
About the dueling forces in you?
Now you barely remember your youth
You used to embrace the eerie and helm
Visitations from spirit realms
Gifted to see between astral planes
Now you plead to be plain

[Chorus]
A bystander
Of bygone standards
They'll watch you waste away, waste away, waste away, waste away
Don't waste your candor
On bystanders
They'll watch you waste away, waste away, waste away, waste away
(Waste away, waste away, waste away)
[Post-Chorus]
(They'll watch you waste away, waste away, waste away)
The minute you mitigate your fire (Waste away, waste away, waste away)
The innocence of carnal desire (Waste away, waste away, waste away)
Is stolen (Waste away, waste away, waste away)
It's stolen (Waste away, waste away, waste away)

[Verse 3]
And it's true that the truth gives you free
But when truth is a breach of decree
Dying for praise from a gallery
Whose morality is grey
And they tie all their stones to your name
And they cripple your bones with their shame
Honesty is the most moral way
But morality is grey