Law in My Bones

There’s a courtroom in my ribcage, judge behind my eyes, Hammer drops at daybreak, every habit on the line. The law reads clean as daylight, carved straight, true, and fine But my hands keep reachin’ backward to the dust I left behind. I do what I hate, and the hate ain’t gone, Got a right-way map and I drive it wrong. Good road’s marked, but the wheels just spin There’s a law in my mind, and a war in my skin. Oh mercy, I’m a house divided down the joists and stones The Law is good; it’s me that’s broke I feel that law in my bones. There’s a factory in my nature pressin’ sin out of the good, Turnin’ Sunday-best intentions into splinters in the wood. Sold under it like wages, stamped, numbered, and owned, I sign with trembling letters, then I break what I’ve been shown. I do what I hate, and the hate ain’t gone, Got a right-way map and I drive it wrong. Good road’s marked, but the wheels just spin There’s a law in my mind, and a war in my skin. Oh mercy, I’m a house divided down the joists and stones The Law is good; it’s me that’s broke I feel that law in my bones. I delight in holy letters yeah, the man I am within But another law is lurkin’ in the tendons, blood, and grin. It stalks me in the mirror, drags me past the warning signs, Claps irons on my ankles while it whispers, “You are mine.” Miserable man say it plain Who’s gonna break these chains? Harmonica cries like a midnight train, Tele twines through the ache and the rain. Voice from the gallows, bright as dawn: “Thanks be to God through the Crucified One.” If I’m mind to His road, He’ll steer me home While this flesh still fights, He won’t let go. I do what I hate, but the hate won’t reign, Grace cut a path through the rust and the chain. Good road’s paved by a nail-scarred King New heart hums while the old one stings. Oh Jesus, be my mercy, be my cornerstone The Law is good; You make me whole Write Your law in my bones. Judge still sits. Gavel still falls. But the debt got paid—blood on the walls.