Ravens Over the Quarter

Verse

Tar roof at five, feed sack heavy on my shoulder

Grandfather's coop, wire bent but it's older

Than half the block, older than the corner store sign

He said watch the wings before you watch the time

Taught me how a bird knows home from a mile

Taught me patience when the block turned hostile

Scar on my palm from the mesh when I was ten

Same scar he carried, same hands, different men

Curfew lights hit the alley like a slow strobe

Feathers black as the coats they zip on the cold

Every morning I climb up before the sun clocks in

Count the birds like counting who made it, who's thin

Pre-Chorus

Do they circle 'cause they're loyal, or they circle 'cause they're lost

Every wing that comes back home was a bet against the cost

Chorus

Ravens over the quarter, keeping score on who's still breathing

Ash on the chimney, names I'm never leaving

They rise off the roofline when the sirens start to call

Ravens over the quarter watching over us all

Verse

Papers said the block was cursed, said it twice in print

Never asked the coop keeper how the winter went

Fed the birds on credit when the feed store closed

Kept the ledger honest, kept the wire froze

Buried one under the drainpipe, marked it with a stone

Kept flying anyway, kept the rest of them home

They ask why I still climb when my knees don't want to

I tell them ask the birds why they still return

Pre-Chorus

Do they circle 'cause they're loyal, or they circle 'cause they're lost

Every wing that comes back home was a bet against the cost

Chorus

Ravens over the quarter, keeping score on who's still breathing

Ash on the chimney, names I'm never leaving

They rise off the roofline when the sirens start to call

Ravens over the quarter watching over us all

Bridge

One day my hands won't climb that ladder no more

Somebody young gon' inherit the wire, the scar, the war

I'll be the name that circles, not the one that feeds

Still counted every morning by the wings that I need

Chorus

Ravens over the quarter, keeping score on who's still breathing

Ash on the chimney, names I'm never leaving

They rise off the roofline when the sirens start to call

Ravens over the quarter watching over us all