I woke before the warning bell To a stair that stood on empty air I know the marks a chisel leaves No hand alive had touched that stone The fairest work I'd ever seen I watched it while the street began to run Still it climbs It grows a room for every room we clear So fair I half forgot to run Still it climbs And the last stair is never the last We cleared the low rooms door to door A chamber shut the lane we'd won A roof went folding in on beds Its cornerstones had left the ground I ran one street behind the fall I came to find the door already gone Still it climbs It grows a room for every room we clear It's taking rooms with people in Still it climbs And the last stair is never the last The chapel hill split open in the dark The graves gave up their carved stone to the sky And in the fairest stair it's ever raised I read the letters of my own two hands The names I cut to keep the dead in ground Are steps The ladders stopped a floor too low The ropes fell back from rising stone The wizard's ring burned shut and true Around a stair no longer there We dug where doorways stood And voices came from higher floors Still it climbs It grows a room for every room we clear The names I carved now bear its weight Still it climbs And the last stair is never the last We dug him out at first light, white with lime Not one mark on him, head to heel His fists shut hard around the page I looked at him, and kept my chisel still The sun ran up its side and found no end New stone rose above the highest stair Still it climbs
