The Lacquer Veins

[Verse 1]
The late light of a Tuesday spills on the North Street brick,
She's tracing every fracture with a bamboo pick.
A shattered porcelain teacup from the market down the way,
The pieces laid like coastline islands in a quiet clay-grey bay.

[Chorus]
And she mends it all together with a vein of liquid sun,
Unspooling a new story where the old one came undone.
She fills the ache with gold.

[Verse 2]
The smell of dust and urushi lacquer hangs inside the door,
A silence like the moment after a wave has left the shore.
She whispered once, “The break’s the thing that makes you look anew”,
Then brushed a line of gold dust where the damage split it through.

[Chorus]
And she mends it all together with a vein of liquid sun,
Unspooling a new story where the old one came undone.
She fills the ache with gold.

[Bridge]
Most of us just darn the holes and hope the seam will hold,
But she maps the jagged ruin with a river we can follow.

[Chorus]
And she mends it all together with a vein of liquid sun,
Unspooling a new story where the old one came undone.
She fills the ache with gold.