[Intro, cold synth arpeggio, sub bass swell, vocoder voice] Open the map on your phone. There's a blue dot. That's you. Now tell me how it knows. [Verse 1, cold hypnotic double-time chopper, locked to the arp] I believe it in an instant, I'd follow it into a strange city at night, off a highway exit I never seen, and I'm right, or I think that I'm right, Do I know how it knows? Somethin' 'bout satellites, somethin' 'bout signals, my phone listenin' up to the sky, close enough to get me to dinner, I ride, Up in orbit they circle, broadcastin' the time from the clocks that they carry, my phone hear a few, the tiny differences tell it where I must be, guided, Read it again, my place is calculated from time, the blue dot is a clock problem, a where that's made out of when, and I'm ridin' it, Phase-lock from orbit, the calendar move tightened to a hair, every satellite clock gotta agree with the others, my phone fall in step, synced to the air, Many clocks fallin' in step, everybody's copy of now agreein', strangers on four continents synced, never met, when it's right, it's a miracle there, When it's wrong, the error don't stay in one place, it ride on the sync, I would never feel it, the dot still blue, just somewhere I ain't, and I'd follow it there... [Hook, sung, descending, airy reverb, call-and-response echoes] The river is honest (honest), the line is a decision (decision), Blue dot on the glass (the glass), it's a clock in disguise (disguise), They renamed the hill (the hill), but nobody re-measured (measured), The ground is real (it's real)... the picture of it is a claim... [Hook, fast chant] Clock problem, clock problem, place made of time, latitude, longitude, zero on a line, somebody picked it, Phase-locked from orbit, the river keep runnin', the ground keep pushin' back, but the picture keep comin'... [Verse 2, floating melodic chopper bounce, harmonized] Put the phone down, go stand by a river, it run downhill, don't know what country it's in, don't know its own name, don't care which bank is "ours," You can put your hand in it, the river is honest, the line on the map is a decision, somebody signed it and drew it, stood with a rifle and said "here" with the power, Then everybody after got handed the line like the river drew it, the water is honest, the line is borrowed, handed down hour by hour, Same with the names, a street named for someone I never looked up, a town, a state, a country, a continent, names over names, spoken with total confidence, louder, [Verse 2 continued, switch-up, fastest] Change the sticker, keep the ground, it's B.C. to B.C.E., same hill, same harbor, same bend in the road with a new word painted over the old, nobody re-measured, they just renamed it, Latitude got somethin' real, the equator sit where the spin put it, the poles where the axis come out, but longitude, there's no natural zero, nobody found it, they framed it, A line had to be picked, and it run through Greenwich, in England, a room full of delegates agreed, every point on the Earth measured off of a town most people never gon' see, It's useful, it works, ships don't hit each other 'cause of it, it's still a house, and a flat map of a round world can't be true, can't peel a sphere flat without stretchin' it, can't be, I learned the size of the countries from a picture that had to distort 'em, I wasn't fooled by a villain, I was handed a tradeoff and nobody mentioned it was one to me, [Verse 3, half-time drop, whispered, then double-time] Now the map is alive, it reroute, show me photos, reviews, the inside of the restaurant, and in SE any of it can be made by somethin' that was never anywhere, A storefront that look open, a beach that look clean, a neighborhood safe or dangerous, dependin' who wanted me to think so, I find out when I arrive, I find out late, after the drive, after the money, after I told three friends 'bout the place, And the war zone, the protest, the flood two states over, never tested by my tires, the ground can't push back on a place I'll never stand, I only get the picture in place of the place... [Hook, sung, descending, airy, echoes] The river is honest (honest), the line is a decision (decision), Blue dot on the glass (the glass), it's a clock in disguise (disguise), They renamed the hill (the hill), but nobody re-measured (measured), The ground is real (it's real)... the picture of it is a claim... [Hook, fast chant] Clock problem, clock problem, place made of time, latitude, longitude, zero on a line, somebody picked it, Phase-locked from orbit, the river keep runnin', the ground keep pushin' back, but the picture keep comin'... [Outro, arp rides out, then cuts] Keep the map, use the map, arrive at dinner (dinner)... Know which part you standin' on, and which part you was told (was told)... Deduction, intuition, or a borrowed line?
