Verdant Form

[Verse 1]
The linoleum floor at the County-USC sweats in the Tuesday glare of a quarter-past-three.
Smell of ammonia and paper rot, the fluorescent hum asks what you got.
The line ain't moved but the clock hand has, every face a cracked hourglass.
He watches the dust climb a sunbeam shaft, a quiet riot, the aftermath
of a promise made on a different street, now he's just a number on a heat-warped seat.
Trying to prune a branch of the family tree that grew poison fruit, you see.
He grips the papers, the ink is fading, a seven-year silence he's been evading,
all comes down to this waiting room, a sterile, beige, official tomb.

[Chorus]
Nod and you smile, sir.
Checkin' the file, sir.
Wait for a while, sir.
Just for the pile, sir.

[Verse 2]
The plexiglass window is thick with grease, a portrait of a fractured peace.
The woman behind it, her mouth is a line, practicing a kindness that isn't kind.
A plastic pothos, root-bound in a cup, dyin' of thirst but it ain't givin' up.
He slides the folder through the little slot, the only key that he ever got.
"Next form in green," she says, not lookin' up from the screen, an unmovable piece in a vast machine.
The deadbolt click of a rubber stamp is a closing door in a concrete camp.

[Chorus]
Nod and you smile, sir.
Checkin' the file, sir.
Wait for a while, sir.
Just for the pile, sir.

[Bridge]
Oxalis weed through the pavement crack by the bus stop bench, it ain't turnin' back.
No one planted it, no one gives it water, a forgotten son, a forsaken daughter.
Just finds a way to breathe in the grime, makin' its peace with the lack of time.

[Outro]
The carbon copy proves you were here.
Then the silence. The institutional fear.