People's Faces

It's coming to pass
 My country's coming apart
 The whole thing's becoming
 Such a bumbling farce
 Was that a pivotal historical moment
 We just went stumbling past?
 Well, here we are
 Dancing in the rumbling dark
 So come a little closer
 Give me something to grasp
 Give me your beautiful, crumbling heart
 Another disaster, catharsis
 Another half-discarded mirage
 Another mask slips
 I face off with the physical
 My head's ringing from the love of the stars
 There is too much pretense here
 And too much depends on the fragile wages
 And extortionate rents here
 We're working every dread day that is given us
 Feeling like the person people meet really isn't us
 Like we're going to buckle underneath the trouble
 Like any minute now the struggle's going to finish us
 And then we smile at all our friends
 It's hard
 We got our heads down and our hackles up
 Our backs against the wall
 I can feel you aching
 None of this was written in stone
 There is nothing we're forbidden to know
 And I can feel things changing
 Even when I'm weak and I'm breaking
 I'll stand weeping at the train station
 'cause I can see your faces
 There is so much peace to be found in people's faces
 I saw it roaring
 I felt it clawing at my clothes like a grieving friend
 It said, "there are no new beginnings
 Until everybody sees that the old ways need to end"
 But it's hard to accept that we're all one and the same flesh
 Given the rampant divisions between oppressor and oppressed
 But we are though
 More empathy, less greed, more respect
 All I've got to say has already been said
 I mean, you heard it from yourself
 When you were lying in your bed and couldn't sleep
 Thinking, "couldn't we be doing this differently?"
 I'm listening to every little whisper in the distance singing hymns
 And I can
 I can feel things changing
 But it's so hard
 We got our heads down and our hackles up
 Our backs against the wall
 I can feel your heart racing
 None of this was written in stone
 The currents fast but the river moves slow
 And I can feel things changing
 Even when I'm weak and I'm breaking
 I stand weeping at the train station
 'cause I can see your faces
 There is so much peace to be found in people's faces
 It's not enough
 To imagine we'll be happy when we've
 Got enough stuff
 All this stuff is blocking us
 I'm neat with no chaser
 I'm all spirit, but I'm sinking
 Because the days are not days but strange symptoms
 And this age is our age
 But our age is rage sinking to beige
 And, yes, our children are brave
 But their mission is vague
 Now, I don't have the answers
 But there are still things to say
 I stare out at my city on another difficult day
 And I scream inwardly, "when will this change?"
 I'm beginning to fade
 But my sanity's saved 'cause I see your faces
 My sanity's saved 'cause I can see your faces
 It's hard
 We got our heads down and our hackles up
 Our backs against the wall
 I can feel your heart racing
 None of this was written in stone
 The current's fast but the river moves slow
 And I can feel things changing
 Even when I'm weak and I'm breaking
 I stand weeping at the train station
 'Cause I can see your faces
 I love people's faces