La Frontière

Lyrics

[Intro]
The clock on the wall has no hands.
Just a smooth, white face.
It measures nothing.
It promises nothing.

[Verse 1]
The chair is a specific shade of beige.
Vinyl, cool against the skin of my arms.
Wiped clean a thousand times.
My name was called an hour ago, or maybe it was yesterday.
It left my body, hung in the air like smoke, and then dissolved.
Now I am just the shape in this chair.
The magazine in my lap is from last April.
The faces in it have already moved on.
They have crossed their own frontiers.

[Chorus]
And I am here, at La Frontière.
Not the person I was when I walked through the sliding glass door.
Not the person I will be when the next one opens.
I am the space between two breaths.
The pause at the top of the stairs.
Neither here nor there.

[Verse 2]
There are others.
A man across the room stares at the wall where the clock hands should be.
A woman twists a paper coffee cup, the logo worn away by her thumb.
We don't speak.
We are all initiates here, as Victor Turner wrote.
Stripped of our histories, our jackets, our plans for dinner.
Anonymous.
Waiting for the ritual to end.
Or to begin.

[Chorus]
And we are here, at La Frontière.
Not the people we were when we walked through the sliding glass door.
Not the people we will be when the next one opens.
We are the space between two heartbeats.
The silence between the train cars.
Neither here nor there.

[Bridge]
This room is every airport gate at 3 a.m.
Every moment after the question is asked, before the answer arrives.
It's the newly poured concrete, waiting for walls.
It's the stillness just before dawn breaks.
Betwixt and between.
Just betwixt and between.

[Outro]
A name is called.
It isn't mine.
The vinyl sighs as a shape stands up and walks away.
The air settles.
The hum continues.
The white clock face watches.