Obol

Lyrics

I wash the heel. I fold the sheet.

They call me the Reverend, they expect me to pray,
To talk about mansions and streets made of glass.
But I send the weeping relations away,
To sit with the body and wait for the hour to pass.
I’ve preached on the glory of spirit and grace,
But a man is a heavy and physical debt.
And before I pull linen down over his face,
I settle the ledger the living forget.

What is a lifetime of breaking the ground?
What is the sum of the breath in a lung?
The measure is drawn and the balance is found,
In a cold piece of silver tucked under the tongue.
It wouldn't buy water, it's lighter than rain,
But it’s perfectly sized for the ferryman's chain.
The smallest of fractions, the absolute least—
And enough for the crossing.

I pry the jaw open a fraction apart,
My hand knows the hinge in the dark without sight.
There is no use measuring blood in the heart,
When standardizing the end gets it right.
A pauper, a mayor, a thief on the run,
They don't take your acres, they don't take your rings.
Just this little metal kept out of the sun,
With the stamp of an owl rubbed flat on the wings.

What is a lifetime of breaking the ground?
What is the sum of the breath in a lung?
The measure is drawn and the balance is found,
In a cold piece of silver tucked under the tongue.
It wouldn't buy water, it's lighter than rain,
But it’s perfectly sized for the ferryman's chain.
The smallest of fractions, the absolute least—
And enough for the crossing.

We spend all our decades demanding our worth,
We haggle the market for iron and bread.
But the terrible scale at the edge of the earth,
Takes the exact same sliver of weight from the dead.
He won't make change.
He doesn't need to.

I press the chin upward.
The muscle gives way.
A click of the teeth in the quiet room.
The fare has been gathered.
There is nothing else you can pay.