Verse 1 The gallery was hushed and wide (A) With velvet ropes and lantern light (A) Where scholars stared from varnished time (A) As if they’d never truly died (C) Verse 2 Their collars stiff with powdered grace (A) Their patient hands upon a book (A) Each painted mind in solemn pose (A) Still studying the ones who look (C) Pre-Chorus The brass plates bore forgotten years Of lectures lost to dust and tears Yet every careful name appeared In whispers spoken downstairs Chorus Portraits that watch you When no one else can see Eyes like quiet questions Fixed in varnished memory Portraits that watch you With patience carved in oil Every gilded scholar Guarding centuries of toil Verse 3 One face I’d seen the night before (A) In candlelight below the floor (A) A scholar standing at the door (A) Yet painted here a century more (C) Verse 4 Another stared with knowing calm (A) A professor from the hidden room (A) His likeness framed in ancient gold (A) Signed centuries before his birth (C) Bridge You said the mind survives its cage When thought escapes the printed page That knowledge passed from age to age May wear another scholar’s face But every word you chose to say Left darker meanings in its wake Final Chorus Portraits that watch you While candlelight grows thin Every silent witness Knows the truth beneath your skin Portraits that watch you Patient as the stone Every mind remembered May not leave the halls alone
