Chrome Prayer

Lyrics [Intro] night— all chrome & prayer all cameras / cables / air a poster smiles like it invented dawn [Verse 1] down the avenue of borrowed light where uniforms iron the edge of night the loudspeakers bloom with a lacquered grin saying everybody wins / everybody wins but the walls have ears and the tea has eyes and the joke wears cologne with official lies i watch young sparks in the market sway selling tomorrow in a sideways way [Pre-Chorus] oh, the banners kiss the weather like paper saints in cheap parade and the truth slips out in static through every promise factory-made [Chorus] Iran— under the neon of a nervous sky Iran— where the headlines pose and the mothers sigh Iran— where the kings are gone but the stage remains powdered with slogans / polished with chains Iran— and the street says more than the state can plan [Verse 2] there’s a man on screen with a holy frown trying to staple the moonlight down but the girls walk past with a weathered grace history tucked in the tilt of a face and the boys make beats from a blackout hum tap-tap truth on a plastic drum while the old guard dines on a script of fear and calls it peace when the room won’t hear [Pre-Chorus] oh, the mirrors crack in whispers not enough to wake the throne but enough to show the gold leaf peeling from the great unknown [Chorus] Iran— under the neon of a nervous sky Iran— where the headlines pose and the mothers sigh Iran— where the kings are gone but the stage remains powdered with slogans / polished with chains Iran— and the street says more than the state can plan [Bridge] i do not sing for missiles or men who love a map too much i sing for hands that hide a book for lips that turn a lock to dust for laughter smuggled under breath for dancing in a shuttered room for every small electric no that teaches concrete how to bloom [Final Chorus] Iran— not the sermon / not the fist / not the grand disguise Iran— but the pulse that lives behind the eyes Iran— where the future leans through a half-closed door high-heeled courage on a marble floor Iran— and the night can’t keep what the dawn began Iran— the street says more than the state can plan [Outro] night— still chrome / still prayer but listen— something brighter moves in the air not the lie not the plan Iran.