Lyrics:

From the 2010 album, “Goodness Gracious”.
For Chris Otepka’s own commentary on the song, see his 2011 NPR Tiny Desk solo performance (13:29 onward).
“This song is about a dude, Carl Beakman…”Is there a sign on the back of my head
That says
Desensitized?
Well I'm sorry I said anything
You sang a song
You then learned to sing
And said that you missed the songs you sang
Before you learned anything
In a fishbowl on the beach
I know the salty water stings
But it's not hard to see
From a bowl the world's out of reach
I see my face in the lake at the end of a pier
All the fish seem to wonder what I'm doing here
When I hold my head under and hear them all scoff
I just open up my mouth and let my mind jump off
It says there's a sign at the end of this swamp
That says destruct, it's fucked it's done it's just mud
No such dumb luck
Construct new huts
Blind new kinds of ducks
Then make them occupy new titles
Like on the royal isle
Where they print up a phone book
As thick as a bible

You were baptized in a river
I was thrown off a bridge
Then I landed on a crab you slept with seahorses
I started having seizures, you started having kids
You found your inner self, I found my inner fish
And my other car is a boat, it has a boat name
I thought we both came, but no
No such conch, no pontoon, no one is listening to you
The sun does wonders to your brain the way it burns right through
I am swimming in a trough
I'm sure you've written me off by now
But just when I think that all is lost
I see you stepping in the water
To me every edge of the lake is a fifty foot cliff
And once you are swimming with me there's no way out of this
So let's just turn back into amphibians
Let's just tread until our legs give in
Let's start over