The BeltLine Corridor: Iron Veins Below

Lyrics

[Intro]
Hummmm.
Hummmm.
Below the brick.
Below the bone.

[Verse 1]
Eighteen-ninety.
Before the walls went up.
I was here.
Iron spine laid in red clay.
They built the floor right over me.
A roof on my thunder.
Felt the first mortar set.
Felt the weight of the warehouse settle.
A drum skin.
Waiting.

[Chorus]
I am the vein. The iron vein below.
I am the pulse the floorboards know.
Coal smoke breath and a steel-on-steel groan.
Carrying the cotton. Carrying the stone.
I am the rumble in the city's bone.

[Verse 2]
Sidney Johnston feels it in his teeth.
The ink in his ledger shivers on the leaf.
A five-AM tremor, right on time.
Another train of white gold on my line.
The whole building breathes with my passing.
A long, slow shudder.
Everlasting.
The smell of hot oil and creosote seeps through the cracks.
There is no silence between the tracks.

[Chorus]
I am the vein. The iron vein below.
I am the pulse the floorboards know.
Coal smoke breath and a steel-on-steel groan.
Carrying the flour. Carrying the stone.
I am the rumble in the city's bone.

[Bridge]
The brakeman's ghost still walks the ties.
He never knew the building's eyes.
Just the dark passage, the signal's gleam.
The endless, heavy, river-dream.
Then the steam grew thin.
The whistles died.
The long black snake had nowhere left to hide.
Decades of silence.
A held breath.

[Outro]
Now... a new weight.
A lighter tread.
Footsteps and laughter overhead.
A silver bell where the whistle screamed.
But listen close.
In the quiet.
When the last bike has gone.
You feel me.
Hummmm.