Foundation Stone

[Verse 1]
At the Formica table of the Pho 99
Old Man Tran is tryin' to make a crooked line straight.
A rusty ten-penny nail he's had since '85,
Rolls it under his thumb, just testing its weight.

[Pre-Chorus]
He sees the ghost of a half-built wall,
A two-by-four frame against the Madera sky,
Before the money ran out, before that fall—
The kind of blueprint a younger man lives by.

[Chorus]
It's more than a nail he's tryin' to bend back true,
It's a promise hangin' in an empty room.
A little piece of iron is all he's holding to,
His own foundation stone, pulled from the tomb.

[Verse 2]
The waitress tops his trà đá, don't even have to ask.
He just nods a thank you, never meets her eye.
His life's been full of small, completed tasks,
But that one broken window is the reason why...

[Pre-Chorus]
He still feels the splinter from that cheap pine board,
Still hears the hammer miss in the August heat.
A language of failure he could well afford,
A load-bearing silence, bitter and complete.

[Chorus]
It's more than a nail he's tryin' to bend back true,
It's a promise hangin' in an empty room.
A little piece of iron is all he's holding to,
His own foundation stone, pulled from the tomb.

[Bridge]
He remembers her voice through the kitchen screen,
Felt like a hundred years ago, last Tuesday night.
She said, "Anh yêu, just leave it. Some walls stay unseen."

[Chorus]
But it's more than a nail he's tryin' to bend back true,
It's a boarded-up doorway he can't get through.
That little piece of iron is all he's holding to,
His own foundation stone, trying to make it new.

[Outro]
Click-click-click on the tabletop at 9:05.
Almost straight now. Almost alive.