Summer People

[Intro] [Lone clean electric guitar, long reverb tail, distant wind, sparse and cold] [Verse 1] [Low, patient, wintry, minimal backing] Plywood on the clam shack windows, lifeguard chairs stacked bone on bone. The ocean's out there still performing to a boardwalk full of no one. The trains run right along my water, loud and bright and through. Not one of them has ever stopped here. February, I rehearse for you. [Pre-Chorus] [Thawing, drums fading in, building] First warm Friday, fryer oil in the air, screen doors getting their voices back, hydrangeas doing their one blue trick, and here you come, and here you come. [Chorus] [Full band detonates, summer flood, gang vocals on the title] SUMMER PEOPLE, summer people, coconut and gasoline, you say you'd live here if you could. You could. You don't. I hold your spot. Summer people, summer people, sandy floors and out-of-state, I am everybody's summer. I am no one's wintertime. [Verse 2] [Full warm groove, affectionate, alive] June, and I'm somebody again, every cottage window open-eyed. Your kids learn to swim in my cold green water, your grandmothers nap inside my shade. I memorize your bikes against my fences, your fireworks, your first beers, your names. You think that you're just passing through me. "Nobody passes through. I keep everything." [Chorus] [Huge, joyful and aching at once] Summer people, summer people, coconut and gasoline, you say you'd live here if you could. You could. You don't. I hold your spot. Summer people, summer people, sandy floors and out-of-state, I am everybody's summer. I am no one's wintertime. [Bridge] [Strip to pads and heartbeat kick, intimate, near spoken] But hey, you in the window in February, shoveling out an empty crosswalk, who knows me with my makeup off, who waves the last car south in September and turns around to all that quiet: I wasn't singing to you. "You're not summer people, honey. You're load-bearing." [Final Chorus] [Biggest of the song, drums crash back, gang vocals wide] SUMMER PEOPLE, summer people, coconut and gasoline, they say they'd live here if they could. They could. They don't. We hold their spots. Summer people, summer people, taillights running south tonight, we are everybody's summer. We are no one's wintertime. [Outro] [Band falls away to lone cold guitar and wind, voice small again] First cold rain, plywood going up, the ocean keeps performing. I hold your spot... I hold your spot... [Fade out] [End]