Crawl

Track sixteen on Little Homes (May 31, 2016), the album closer after All Her Books. Walton/Woodward co-write. BMI’s metaphysics thread, and the one place the record drops the satire and ends on aspiration.

There is a place that I have heard someone once found through harder work than you or I will ever know, and the narrator concedes he may not get there. That concession becomes the refrain, forgiveness without arrival: so if I cannot reach it, forgive me for the way I crawl. After fifteen tracks of little homes, bodies, and bystanders, crawling is offered as honest motion rather than failure. The last verse lifts the whole thing level: there is a light that God himself must bow his head to every single night, as we sleep, you and I and God alike, we dream of better bigger things. Even the divine sleeps and dreams here, and the final phrase is better bigger things, scale escaped instead of a little home defended.

The song stops there, no return to the crawl. It bookends Outro and follows Blanket. Track eight Intro is instrumental on the album page.

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There is a place
That I have heard someone once found through
Harder work
Than you or I
Will ever know so by that line I
Waste my precious little time
So if I cannot reach it,
Forgive me for the way I crawl, oh.
And if I cannot see it,
Maybe I'm better off, oh.
There is a light
That God himself must bow his head to
Every single night,
As we sleep
You and I and God alike
We dream of better bigger things