Dead Reckoning

[Verse 1]
The Hibernian Hall is breathing out bourbon on the breeze.
This August humidity hangs like a key from the live oak trees.
Every smile's a fixed point of longitude, a measured degree.
I'm decoding the atmospheric pressure between them and me.

[Chorus]
But this kind of quiet ain't peace.
It's just the sound of a long, slow cease.
I'm lost in the noise, trying to chart a signal of release.

[Verse 2]
The program in my hand is damp from the Lowcountry heat.
I got a Gullah cadence hiding under the syntax of Meeting Street.
He claps my shoulder, says "'Son, you got good rhythm in your feet.'"
And the whole room keeps time to a polite, insistent beat.

[Bridge]
They drew this city's grid before my people had a name.
And my true north is a language they'll never learn to frame.

[Chorus]
This kind of quiet ain't peace.
It's just the sound of a long, slow cease.
I'm lost in the noise, trying to chart a signal of release.

[Final Chorus / Outro]
(Key change up a semitone, instruments begin to strip away)
This kind of quiet ain't my peace.
(Drums and bass out)
It's just a long, slow… cease.
(Hammond fades out)
I'm done translating the static for some signal of release.
(Acapella, sharp and clear)
Declassified.