City of Homes: Holding the Line

Lyrics

[Intro]
Did you feel that?
The air just shifted.
Another foundation poured down on Kirkwood Avenue.
The sound of nail guns, a new kind of woodpecker.

[Verse 1]
I trace the lines on your clapboard skin, this old house.
Victorian trim, Craftsman bones.
A city of homes, that’s what the sign says.
That’s what the mayor says.
But there’s a new notice stapled to the telephone pole, flapping in the humid air.
A hearing for a variance, a change in the code.
Another line to be redrawn while we sleep.

[Chorus]
Holding the line.
We’re just holding the line.
Is it the property line, marked by the old azalea hedge?
Is it the roofline against the Georgia sky?
Or just a pencil mark on a zoning map, color-coded and clean?
Who’s holding the pencil?
Just holding the line.

[Verse 2]
I walk down College Avenue, where the pavement remembers.
I can almost feel it.
Nineteen fifty-nine.
The long, cold shadow of a concrete wall.
A line held with rebar and fear.
They called it protecting their homes then, too.
The ghost of that wall is a crack in the sidewalk, long and deep.

[Chorus]
Holding the line.
We’re still holding the line.
Is it the property line, marked by the old azalea hedge?
Is it the roofline against the Georgia sky?
Or just a memory etched in the pavement, uneven and real?
Who holds the memory?
Just holding the line.

[Bridge]
The looms at the Scottdale Mill are silent now.
The brick just echoes with new voices, new rent checks.
And they tell us we must balance what was with what will be.
But the smell of fresh-cut lumber is so much louder than the dust.
The future is a crane on the horizon.

[Outro]
The evening comes.
The porch light hums.
And I'm just here, holding the deed to this small piece of ground.
Holding my breath.
Holding the quiet.
Holding the line.