Title: Threshold [Intro] [Clean bass, sparse piano, muted floor tom.] [Vocals close and subdued.] Nothing followed me here No teeth at my back No hands through the wall No voice in the wiring No warning at all Only a room Without length or width And a door That casts no shadow [Verse 1] [Soft 5/4 groove.] I set my name beside the entrance Along with everything I knew The habits that had passed for instinct The face mistaken for the truth I laid the years out in a straight line Then watched them lose their order Birth and death became two markings Drawn on opposite sides of water [Pre-Chorus] No judge No guide No answer on the other side No choir No throne Just somewhere I had never been alone [Chorus] [Wide, restrained harmonies.] There is no final doorway Only another threshold Every ending waits With its hand upon the handle I came here for an answer I came here to be whole But the room kept getting larger The more I let things go [Instrumental] [Alternating 5/4 and 6/4.] [Hand drums and warped guitar harmonics.] [Verse 2] There were figures in the distance Borrowing a human scale Each one faced a different doorway Each one waiting without fail No one spoke No one moved No one seemed afraid They stood as if continuation Were a debt that must be paid I asked the nearest figure How long it had been there It turned without a face And pointed everywhere [Pre-Chorus] No clock No sun No proof that anything had begun No wall No floor Yet every step returned me to the door [Chorus] [Low distortion enters.] There is no final doorway Only another threshold Every ending waits With its hand upon the handle I came here for an answer I came here to be whole But the room kept getting larger The more I let things go [Bridge] [Instrumentation drops to bass, piano, and breath.] I left my anger at the entrance It entered after me I left my grief beside my body It was already in the seat I left the dead where memory kept them They were standing farther in I left myself outside the doorway Something wearing me walked in [Build] [Tribal toms and overdriven bass rise.] I reached the highest point And found another stair I crossed the final line And found it waiting there I emptied out my hands The weight remained somehow I spent my life approaching What was underneath me now [Breakdown] [Heavy, deliberate.] NO DESTINATION NO RELEASE NO FINAL FORM NO PERFECT PEACE NO LAST WORD NO CLOSING PAGE ONLY THE DOOR ONLY THE STAGE NO ENDING WAITING TO MAKE THIS CLEAR ONLY THE STEP FROM THERE TO HERE [Sudden stop.] [Interlude] [Distant three-note motif.] [Opening pulse returns.] I know that sound (Low harmony) I heard it Before I was born [Final Chorus] [Full band, unresolved harmony.] There is no final doorway Only another threshold Every ending waits With its hand upon the handle I came here for an answer I came here to be whole But the room was never empty And the door was never closed There is no final doorway Only another threshold Every path I thought behind me Was arranged around a center I came here to surrender What remained beyond control Then something far below me Started pulling at my bones [Outro] [Bass pulse, floor tom, low drone.] The figures turn together The door begins to bend The room becomes a circle The circle has no end A current moves beneath us Not water Not air A depth without direction And something waiting there [Long pause.] [Spoken, calm.] Are you ready? [Silence.] [Very distant voice.] Remember [One enormous tom hit.] [Sub-bass descends.] [Hard cut.] [End]
