Ecstasy Of Gold

[Intro — soprano vocalise, distant, rising] (aaah... aaah...) [Verse 1 — weathered male, low and driving] Rode out with nothin' but the dust on my name, a hundred voices swearin' I'd end up the same — but I saw it out past the graves and the cold: a fire on the far hill the color of gold. [Pre-Chorus — building] They buried better men than me in this ground; I stepped over every stone without a sound. The more they said "you'll never" — the harder I rode toward the light they swore was never mine to hold. [Chorus — soprano soars, full orchestra, ecstatic] (aaah — the ecstasy of gold) Run — don't you slow, don't you fold — everything they said you'd never be is waitin' at the end of the road. (aaah — the ecstasy of gold) [Verse 2] Not the metal, not the money, not the crown — it's the moment that the doubters all fall down, when the thing they called a fool's errand comes true and the sky cracks open gold, and it's callin' you. [Bridge — the run, accelerating, breathless] Faster now — the bells, the drums, the climb, every debt, every doubt left behind in the grime. I can see it — I can see it — I'm almost home — the gold, the gold, and I ran here alone. [Final Chorus — huge, soprano at the ceiling] (aaah — the ecstasy of gold) All the cold years, all the "no," melt to nothin' in the blaze of arrival — this is everything they said I'd never know. (aaah — the ecstasy of gold) [Outro — soprano ringing out, orchestra sustaining] I made it. I made it. (aaah...) ...let it ring.