Weft Mark

[Verse 1]
(A cappella)
The last 48 bus from Piccadilly hums through the rain.
My palm reads like a map of the same old strain.
(Drums and Rhodes enter)
Mama traced this line on me when I was nine, Tuesday, just after ten.
Said our women's hands were made for the needle, not for men.

[Chorus]
And it's a hollow weave, this victory I hold.
A freedom tailored from a story I was told.
Got the two-bed flat and the name they can't fold,
But this weft mark on my hand runs deep and cold.

[Verse 2]
You traced it last night, half-asleep in the dark, a phantom touch.
Said, "It's just a crease from holding a pen so much."
I almost told you about my grandmother's sight, about the thread,
But the cold bus window sweating on my sleeve filled up my head.

[Chorus]
And it's a hollow weave, this victory I hold.
A freedom tailored from a story I was told.
Got the two-bed flat and the name they can't fold,
But this weft mark on my hand runs deep and cold.

[Bridge]
(Tempo slows, becomes more spacious, dreamy)
I see her hands pulling ugwu from the frostbitten ground in Gorton.
I see my mother's knuckles, smoothing a hem that's been shortened.
A legacy of making do, a beautiful, bitter art.
They wove their lives alone, so I could play this part.

[Outro]
Yeah, this mark on my hand...
Aka m. My own two hands.