i could paint you in the dark
cause i've studied you with hunger
as a work of art
and these are very secret days
i collect my information
then i stow it all away
call me
when you breeze through
to your appointments
the work you do
call me
i'm collecting you

the pleading prayer and hairshirt sting
my hairtrigger love and faulty spring
motivaton smokes a name
i don't like that smile applied to me
so blindly just the same
call me
when you breeze through
to your appointments
the work you do
call me
i'm collecting you

turning up my collar
to an unseasonal chill
you ask for a favor
you know i will
and the rain comes as surprise
we fly across the railroad ties
i feel the danger
the foolish thrill
oh yes i will

what it will or won't be then
the shutter predevelopment
the ink full in the pen
mind the minds eye trickery
cause you might picture killer beautiful
much more than it might be
call me
tell me
what you're up to
what you do
call me
i'm collecting you

i would be foolish
to think that i
could turn it off
and stay alive
the way i live
when you switch on
hand on the dimmer
give me just a glimmer
give me just a shadow
of hope around the edges
agony and rapture
forever uncaptured

take these secrets to your grave
drug across your landscape
and buried in your cave
your piling up and out of sight
every try to add it up
feels like counting shades of light
call me
tell me
what you're up to
what you do
call me
i'm collecting you

hang it in my window
let it complicate my view
the separation
the glass of you
but i can paint this picture
any way that i see fit
the art of pain
the subject sits