Softer Science - Dangers

Three A.M.'s back again and the girls are fast asleep, tucked into their beds

up above

Down below, I have nowhere else left to go

Six grey hairs and the fangs of another night playing uncle in this home

What I fear—what I know—is that these girls will never know

All their prayers on their knees won’t stop men just like me from preying,

male gazing, drink-lacing—from turning coddled lives to living hell

Oh, young American girls in young American rooms with young American dreams in

young American wombs

No matter how much you pray, no matter how much you hide, there’s a dorm,

there’s a church full of American boys drunk on American thighs singing:

If it’s the devil that’s in me, then it’s the devil I love

Cross my heart and hope to die

If it’s the devil in me, then it’s the devil I love

One below, and nothing up above

Three A.M.'s back again

I’m dialing digits on my phone

'Cause it’s true: even men just like me, raised properly, respectfully,

have something hiding, something fighting to drag us all below

It’s the devil I love

Devil that I love