Parcel Across the Ash

Verse

Under a sky the colour of tin, I pedal past a crater’s rim
One parcel strapped to my rack like a promise in burlap
Coal smoke fingers the horizon, airships spool a ribbon far off
My lamp is a dented tin and my bell is a kitchen spoon
The boiler room in the bunker huffs a sleepy steam tune
Golly, I wave to a sentry with a clockwork grin

Chorus

Oh, sing me the street I remember, with porches and a jukebox hum
Send me the smell of bakers' ovens and a coalman’s evening drum
I carry a parcel of names and a fold of yesterday’s news
Riding the ash plain, singing for the houses we used to choose

Verse

Pressure gauges wink like constellations on the ridge
A brass airship folds its laundry of bunting over the ridge
My parcel has a ribbon and a note with a child's scrawl
It jingles like pennies in a tin that once bought an ice-cream stall

Chorus

Oh, bring back the corner where the newsboy shouted rain
The lamplighter’s ladder and the licorice man’s cane
I pedal through scrap and cinder with that brown-paper clue
Delivering yesterday, wrapped up, tied, and true

Bridge

spoken word

If you listen at midnight where the pumps keep their slow breath
You can hear parlor piano in the hiss of the steam beneath

Chorus

So pass me your porches, pass me your names in the queue
I’m the postwoman on a bicycle with a parcel and a view
I carry our stories in twine from the shelters to the dew
Riding the ash plain, delivering morning to you