Currency We Bleed For

Intro

Counter light buzzes yellow over Delroy's ledger book

Ninety days on every ticket, that's the only look

Verse

Ledger's full of names that trade their weight for rent

Mrs. Odom's ring came in the same week the roof bent

Told me "just till Friday," Friday turned to spring

She never called it back, left the velvet on the string

Trumpet from a kid named Chess, valve stuck with rust

Said his uncle blew it clean before the horn grew dust

Traded it for bail money, kept the mouthpiece though

Said "some part of the sound, man, I ain't ready to let go"

I stamp the ticket, drop it in the drawer with the rest

Ninety days of waiting is the neighborhood's stress test

Work boots, size eleven, sole worn thin as paper

Man named Curtis pawned them for his daughter's diaper

Came back with the cash before the sun went down

Bought them back at double, called it holding ground

I keep the drawer alphabetized by what they couldn't keep

Every tag's a heartbeat that got traded off for sleep

Hook

This is the currency we bleed for

Every ticket got a story underneath the door

Ninety days to buy it, love left on the floor

This is the currency we bleed for

Verse

My father ran this counter forty years on Baldwin Street

Said the safe don't judge you, it just counts the heat

Taught me read a face before I read the item's worth

A cracked guitar meant somebody's rent came first

Old man Reyes pawned his medals from the war

Said "freedom's heavy, son, don't weigh what it's for"

I hung them on the wall instead of the shelf

Told him no charge, some things you don't sell yourself

Girl named Nadia brought her mother's wedding coat

Said the heat got shut off, needed cash to stay afloat

I gave her extra, wrote the ticket incomplete

Some debts in this shop don't need to be complete

Ninety days pass quiet like a held breath in December

Half the drawer stays full, the other half remembered

I lock up every night and count what's never claimed

Every unclaimed ticket got somebody else's name

Hook

This is the currency we bleed for

Every ticket got a story underneath the door

Ninety days to buy it, love left on the floor

This is the currency we bleed for

Bridge

Sometimes I think about selling the whole block's worth of pain

Melt it down to silver, see what's left to gain

But grief don't smelt like metal, it just sits and multiplies

So I keep the drawer open, let the unclaimed things stay tied

Delroy left the ledger when the sickness took his hand

Told me "keep it honest, son, that's the only brand"

Outro

Counter light still buzzes yellow, closing up at nine

Every name in that drawer is a debt I can't outshine

Currency we bleed for, it don't spend the same

But I keep the books open in the neighborhood's name