Radio Burning (version 2)

Verse

Concrete cracked along the railroad track

Radio's stuck on that one last station playing back

A song about leaving, not arriving anywhere

Engine coughs awake like it knows I'm scared to stay

Daddy used a map before he used his phone

Folded creases deep enough to carry home

Mama kept the same key ring for twenty years

Rust on every name that just disappeared

Pre-Chorus

Is this freedom or just running from the dark?

Is it leaving everything I know and never look back?

Can a voice on the radio be brave enough to start

A fire where my shadow keeps getting lost in the smoke

Chorus

I'm turning up the radio, letting the speakers scream

Every highway line is calling me like a river dream

Burn down what they called me, watch the name go gold

This is how I learn to let go of growing old

Drive through the amber till it's nothing but flame

Watch the world keep moving and I'm not left behind

Radio burning loud as the road starts to change

I was never built for staying, I was built to drive

Verse

Found an old cassette tape in my sister's trunk

Same four songs we'd sing along when the summer got sunk

Static and the wind make it sound like a choir

Every mile is a song I'll carry on my own wire

Gas station sign flickers red then gold then grey

Some nights I don't stop driving till the dark turns day

Fires in the ditch like embers of every goodbye

Every one's a burning mirror catching sparks across the sky

Pre-Chorus

Is this freedom or just running from the dark?

Is it leaving everything I know and never look back?

Can a voice on the radio be brave enough to start

A fire where my shadow keeps getting lost in the smoke

Chorus

I'm turning up the radio, letting the speakers scream

Every highway line is calling me like a river dream

Burn down what they called me, watch the name go gold

This is how I learn to let go of growing old

Drive through the amber till it's nothing but flame

Watch the world keep moving and I'm not left behind

Radio burning loud as the road starts to change

I was never built for staying, I was built to drive

Bridge

Maybe fire don't mean you're lost at all — maybe it means

You were brave enough to leave a version of yourself behind

Daddy's old map still folded up inside my glove compartment

Still got his key ring on the chain around my neck

Some nights I pull over and I scream it out so loud

Till the gravel road just swallows every sound I'm saying now

Chorus

I'm turning up the radio, letting the speakers scream

Every highway line is calling me like a river dream

Burn down what they called me, watch the name go gold

This is how I learn to let go of growing old

Drive through the amber till it's nothing but flame

Watch the world keep moving and I'm not left behind

Radio burning loud as the road starts to change

I was never built for staying, I was built to drive