Song of the Dead☠️🎶⚓️🖤

[Intro] Static scratched the chapel door. Salt crawled up across the floor. One child smiled with empty eyes. Then the whole damn harbor harmonized. ⸻ [Verse 1] Bell rope swung with nobody near. Dead gulls dropped from the atmosphere. Windows breathed like lungs in pain. Black tide tapped on every pane.   Four notes crawled from the radio. Low enough to rot the soul. Old men wept and bit their tongues. They knew the song, but they were young. ⸻ [Station Master] Harbor notice. Do not repeat the melody.   Do not answer voices beneath the water. This broadcast is already infected. ⸻ [Verse 2] Mama sang while the baby cried. Baby laughed with a sailor’s eyes. Preacher drowned in a dry church pew. Still kept preaching when he turned blue.   Fish walked up on the market stones. Clicking teeth like prayer beads and bones. Every clock struck thirteen slow. Then the graves began to glow. ⸻ [The Song Of The Dead] Under the water, under the clay.   We keep the names that washed away.   Light the lantern. Lower the thread.   Sing one verse for the waking dead. ⸻ [Hook] Song of the dead came rolling in. Cold little grin on the harbor wind. Whole town danced while the church bells bled. Nobody lives through the song of the dead.   Black tide clapped and the floorboards bent. Every last breath got borrowed and spent. Mouths still moved when the bodies fell. Singing that hymn from the mouth of hell. ⸻ [Verse 3] Fishermen hooked their fathers’ hands. Pulled them up from the black wet sand. One had coins where his eyes should be. One kept asking, “Do you remember me?”   Widows kissed the fog outside. Came back home with their husbands inside. Not in flesh. Not in bone. Just two wet voices sharing one throat. ⸻ [Station Master] Signal confirmed.   Source is below the harbor. Depth unknown.   Choir count increasing. God help the ones still humming. ⸻ [Verse 4] Kids held hands in a perfect ring. Smiled too wide when they started to sing. Streetlights bent like they had spines. Shadows crawled out ahead of time.   The butcher carved on an empty block. Meat still screamed when the blade got dropped. Names appeared on the pantry wall. Fresh black ink and a funeral scrawl. ⸻ [The Song Of The Dead] Turn the wheel. Ring the bell.   Feed the tide what rose and fell.   No more hunger. No more breath.   Come learn the chorus after death. ⸻ [Hook] Song of the dead came rolling in. Cold little grin on the harbor wind. Whole town danced while the church bells bled. Nobody lives through the song of the dead.   Black tide clapped and the floorboards bent. Every last breath got borrowed and spent. Mouths still moved when the bodies fell. Singing that hymn from the mouth of hell. ⸻ [Verse 5] Stars traded places overhead. North drifted south and east turned dead. Lighthouses pointed out to sea. Then turned around to stare at me.   Schoolyard swings moved on their own. Children answered telephones. Every voice on every line. Sang the chorus word for rhyme. ⸻ [Verse 6] Undead ships slid through the rain. No sails raised, no anchor chain. Crewmen grinned with barnacle jaws. Drummed on ribs with broken claws.   Captains bowed to the harbor lights. Crowns burned green in the dead of night. Heard that tune and laughed instead. “Even kings kneel to the Song of the Dead.” ⸻ [Breakdown] Shoelaces dragged across the stone. Wedding rings spun on their own. Street signs pointed straight below. Toward somewhere nobody should go.   The courthouse clock forgot the hour. Vines erupted through the tower. Salt grew thick on painted walls. Something answered when it called.   A laugh surfaced beneath the pier. Close enough to sound sincere. Far enough to chill the blood. Then the harbor rose like a flood.   The water sang. The town replied. Something ancient opened its eyes. ⸻ [Station Master] Emergency broadcast. Do not sing along.   This is not a transmission. This is an invitation.   Source no longer located below the harbor. Source currently located—   …everywhere. ⸻ [The Song Of The Dead] Under the water, under the clay.   We keep the names that washed away.   Light the lantern. Lower the thread.   Sing one verse for the waking dead. ⸻ [Final Hook] Song of the dead came rolling in. Cold little grin on the harbor wind. Whole town danced while the church bells bled. Nobody lives through the song of the dead.   Black tide clapped and the floorboards bent. Every last breath got borrowed and spent. Mouths still moved when the bodies fell. Singing that hymn from the mouth of hell.   Harbor lights burned sickly red. Every road filled up with the dead. Morning came but the sun still fled. Nobody wakes from the Song of the Dead. ⸻ [Outro] Static died.   The song stayed on.   Every grave was singing along.   Beneath the water.   Something is still singing