The Tamp and the Pull

[Verse 1]
You catch your own face in the Gaggia's steel, a tired and chalky smudge.
Her contactless card makes a beep that isn't real, above your quiet grudge.
The milk screams under the pressure of the wand,
the air is thick and damp.
Just a service, a transaction, a broken bond,
beneath a single lamp.

[Chorus]
It's just the pressure, lad, it's just the steam.
You're building something solid from a fractured dream.
It's just the daily grind, the tamp and the pull.
Keep your strata steady, keep your spirit full.

[Verse 2]
You knew her from a seminar on Keats, that Tuesday in the mizzle.
Her coat smelled then of wet leaves on city streets, not this expensive drizzle
of perfume. 'That you, Nick?' she says, her voice a little thin.
You nod and force a smile, a crackle in the skin.

[Chorus]
It's just the pressure, lad, it's just the steam.
You're building something solid from a fractured dream.
It's just the daily grind, the tamp and the pull.
Keep your strata steady, keep your spirit full.

[Bridge]
(whispers begin, layered, rhythmic: another year, just loose change, the damp in the walls, Buxton stone, not enough, should have stayed, should have...)
And all the careful walls you built come tumbling 'round your feet.
She's talking 'bout a futures fund on Pinstone Street.

[Outro]
You hand her the cup and your fingers almost touch.
She doesn't see how much.