[Intro](instrumental — slow, cold)
what's it gonna cost
[Verse 1] [Half-time] [Deadpan — vocal and sub bass]
They don't inquire how I'm sleeping, they inquire as to my yield
They've no curiosity for the creature, just the figures it can field
Every hour gets a surcharge, every yes arrives accrued
They appraised me to the farthing and decided I'm the farthing too
A contemplation? That's a luxury tax. A sigh? It's itemized
I'm an overhead to amortize, a little sum to be downsized
Worth precisely what I net them, not a halfpenny beyond
A receipt where there was once a boy, the bargain of the bond
[Chorus] [Distorted] [Cold]
Cost is a type — that's the whole of me to you
Cost is a type — expend me, then we're through
It's the solitary fact you ever cared to come to know
Not the who of me, my darling — just the what I cost to own
[Verse 2] [Half-time] [Deadpan]
"Can we afford him?" — that's the question they intone each time I cross the floor
Never is he any good, never is he kindred, just: what's he for
Run the cost-benefit upon me, lay me trembling on the scale
I'm a figure they can strike right through, a column they can sell
[Chorus] [Distorted] [Cold]
Cost is a type — that's the whole of me to you
Cost is a type — expend me, then we're through
It's the solitary fact you ever cared to come to know
Not the who of me, my darling — just the what I cost to own
[Bridge] [Stripped — warm, the one tender moment]
But there's no tariff on the way she enters a room
No invoice for the thing already blooming in the gloom
There's a column in their ledger it will never, ever fill
And that's the only wealth I want — and it costs me nothing still
[Outro](costs me nothing still... costs me nothing still...)
