Verse 1 They said the dam was in the way They said they'd help us find a path Engineers in fluorescent vests Doing the river's math They built a tube up over the concrete Said step inside, we'll get you there I've outswum nets and eagles and current Nothing prepared me for the air Pre-Chorus One second river Next second gone Pressurized and weightless And traveling wrong Chorus I'm airborne Above the treeline Looking down at the world below I'm airborne Undignified and Going somewhere I didn't choose to go Airborne The river is a memory The sky is not where salmon go Airborne Airborne Airborne Verse 2 I can see the valley from up here I can see the mountain and the snow I can see a brown shape at the exit Waiting patient in the shallows below He's been there since before the dam was Been there since before the tube Been there since before the engineers Been there before any of this was new Pre-Chorus One second flying Next second not The bear didn't build this But the bear is what I got Chorus I'm airborne Above the treeline Looking down at the world below I'm airborne Undignified and Going somewhere I didn't choose to go Airborne The river is a memory The sky is not where salmon go Airborne Airborne Airborne Bridge (time signature fractures, 5/4, heavy and disorienting) They saved me from the dam They saved me from the falls They shot me through a plastic tube And delivered me to jaws The bear didn't ask for any of this either Thousand years of standing in the spray Some engineer in Portland changed his morning And he's still there Doing it the old way (extended guitar solo, bends into feedback, odd meter throughout) Outro (single riff repeating, slowing) Airborne The bear is just the bear Airborne Nobody put him there Airborne This was somebody's solution Airborne I am somebody's good intention Landing (abrupt cut to silence)
