Fathom

Lyrics

[Intro]
The lead weight hits the grey.

[Verse 1]
Hand to the shoulder, face to the wind,
Pulling the wet hemp across the chest.
The cold salt runs down the inside of my sleeve,
Taking the measure of what we guess.
Fingertip to fingertip, stretched like a bird,
Drawing the ocean up to the rail.
The white rag knotted in the weave slips past,
A rhythm my shoulders know before I fail.

[Chorus]
This is what it means to understand.
You open your arms to the freezing air
To see how much of the dark you can hold.
They give us a standard, a ghost in the line,
Some tall admiral's shadow we are meant to match.
But I only have my body to throw against the brine,
Hoping for a bottom we can catch.

[Verse 2]
If my reach is a little short, the seabed lies,
And the map we draw will drag us on the rocks.
So I pull until the collarbone groans,
Stretching my joints to fit the rule.
It is a heavy kind of mercy, being made to align,
Knowing the whole fleet trusts this piece of twine.
But I wonder whose bones they laid on the yard,
To tell the rest of us how wide to pull.

[Chorus]
This is what it means to understand.
You open your arms to the freezing air
To see how much of the dark you can hold.
They give us a standard, a ghost in the line,
Some tall admiral's shadow we are meant to match.
But I only have my body to throw against the brine,
Hoping for a bottom we can catch.

[Bridge]
There are trenches where the line just runs.
Where the lead falls and the spool spins out.
You stand at the rail with your hands pulled apart,
Like a man in surrender, like a man in the dark.
Waiting to hit something solid.
Waiting for the ocean to stop.

[Outro]
Pull it back in.
Hand over hand.
I cannot fathom the floor of this.
I spread my arms as wide as they go.
It isn't enough.