Wolf Winter Ledger (version 2)

Intro

Grandpa's ledger by the woodstove, chalk gone black as coal

Wolf winter don't ask questions, only who can pay the toll

Verse

Grandpa ran the trapline when the wolves came down for meat

Marked the pelts in chalk, called it currency, not defeat

Every fox he skinned bought flour, every mink bought coal

Kept a ledger by the woodstove, numbers black as soul

Said the winter don't ask questions, only who can pay the cost

Watched three neighbors starve that season, watched him never lose what's lost

He fed the Hendersons on credit, wrote their name in red

Said a debt kept honest beats a promise never said

I was seven, held the lantern while he checked the snares at dawn

Learned the sound of ice that's breaking under weight it's not withdrawn

He'd hum no hymns, just counted, breath like smoke against the pine

Told me every name inside that book was proof that we survived

Thirty traps, one river, no man came to lend a hand

Still he split the meat in quarters, still he understood demand

Buried that ledger with him, kept the debts but not the shame

Now I run my own cold season, still keep count, still know each name

Chorus

Wolf winter ledger, every debt still owed

Snow don't forgive a name, so I paid it back in gold

Wolves don't wait for spring, I made mine my own road

Kept the count in silence, that's how legends get told

Verse

Block was starving one December, no work, no heat, no play

Kept my own tally on the wall, chalk mark for every day

Fed my cousin off my plate when his check ain't come through

Wrote it down like Grandpa did, said a debt's a bridge, not a rue

Corner boys were circling hungry, everybody wanted more

I split what little bread I had, kept the wolves outside my door

Some nights the block ran red, more debts than dollars in my hand

Still I paid the widow's rent, still I tried to understand

Ledger got so thick with names I had to start a second book

Every page a witness to the hunger, every line a look

At who stood firm when frost came knocking, who ran when it got tough

Learned the difference between a friend and someone calling bluff

I don't flex the corners now, I count what's left to give

Every name still in that ledger is a reason that I live