Core Sample

[Verse 1]
The iron tang of the Patapsco rail, August '03.
My whole geology settled right there on my knees.
Pressure and heat on a fault line of splinter-rough wood,
you were a vein of pure quartz in the misunderstood.

[Chorus]
And it's not a memory, it's just sediment.
Every layer a year that we thought that we spent.

[Verse 2]
The creek ran like rust underneath us, a dull orange smear.
"Don't look down," you said, "it's just water and fear."
A key to a lockbox we buried, a promise in shale,
now it's just strata eroding, a slow-motion fail.

[Chorus]
And it's not a memory, it's just sediment.
Every layer a year that we thought that we spent.

[Bridge]
I see the mica glint on the rock face below,
just a flicker of light where the water runs slow.

[Outro]
Just the sway of the bridge.
And the heat.