Degree of Freedom

[Verse 1]
The Number 19 bus hisses past the Waterstones on Upper Street.
A Tuesday, four pm, the week the clocks went back.
She feels the ozone rise off the wet paving slabs,
The low November sun, a promise she can keep.

[Chorus]
And it's a new degree of freedom in her spine.
She draws the breath she's held the whole damn time.
The shear wall of the past begins to crack.
There is no blueprint for the coming back.

[Verse 2]
He built their life on cold-pour concrete floors,
A brutalist design she learned to call her own.
"You're overthinking the foundations," he would drone,
While she was mapping all the fire escape doors.

[Chorus]
And it's a new degree of freedom in her spine.
She draws the breath she's held the whole damn time.
The shear wall of the past begins to crack.
There is no blueprint for the coming back.

[Instrumental Breakdown]

[Bridge]
But is this cantilevered hope a trick of light?
Just a hairline fracture painted over white?

[Chorus]
Still, a new degree of freedom in her spine.
She draws the breath she's held the whole damn time.
The shear wall of the past begins to crack.
There is no blueprint for the coming back.

[Outro]
The little green man is lit. She crosses the road.