[Intro: wind, one cello note] No net Look up [Hook: male lead, crowd answers] No net! (No net!) Two hundred feet of air Every step a middle finger to the ground down there If I fall, I fall loud, if I fly, I fly No net! (No net!) Look the mornin' in the eye [Verse 1: hungry, fast] Born in a town where the only way out was a bus or a box Learned balance on the rail line, barefoot, duckin' the cops Teacher said, "Get your head out the clouds." Ma'am, that's the plan Practiced on the clothesline with a broomstick in my hands Twenty-nine years of "be careful" and "be real" Braided every warnin' in a cable made of steel Two grain towers sittin' on the edge of the county line Three a.m., me and my cousin and a quarter mile of twine Flew the pilot line across on a kite and a prayer Tensioned it by lantern while the guard snored in his chair Sunrise bleedin' pink across the feed store sign Town wakin' up to find a man walkin' the line [Hook: male lead, crowd answers] No net! (No net!) Two hundred feet of air Every step a middle finger to the ground down there If I fall, I fall loud, if I fly, I fly No net! (No net!) Look the mornin' in the eye [Verse 2: steady, counting steps] First step, toes wrap the cable like a promise Tenth step, pole level, breathin' slow, bein' honest Under me a parkin' lot, a steeple and a diner Sheriff with a bullhorn yellin' up at a climber Mama in her robe with her coffee in the street Every boy who called me crazy starin' up at my feet Whole town holdin' its breath like a choir in a pew Every neck bent back like they're prayin' to the blue Halfway, cable singin', I can feel the county in my soles Every "you'll never" just a pothole in the road [Beat Switch: drums drop out, only wind and a heartbeat] Gust. Pole tips. Left foot slips. Breathe. [Verse 3: triple-time as the drums slam back] Catch it with the hips and the grip and the lip bit, quick fix, ankle on the braid and I'm back like a whip crack Everybody gasp, then a laugh, then a clap, then a roar from the porches and the people in the parkin' lot, and that's that I was never scared of the drop, I was scared of the ground Scared of bein' sixty in the same seat in this town That's the real fall, the slow one, forty years in a chair I'd rather take two hundred feet of honest air [Final Hook: crowd chants, brass wide] No net! (No net!) Two hundred feet of air Every step a middle finger to the ground down there If I fall, I fall loud, if I fly, I fly No net! (No net!) Look the mornin' in the eye [Outro: wind, crowd cheering far below] Other side Feet hangin' Now say I can't
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