Emerald Street

Pregnant teens on the Barton Street bus
Homeless people living off crust
And there’s a beat-up town car – it’s starting to rust
Hard soles are kicking up dust
Half a million people living in the corpse of the brown brick 50’s
To the north, all the small town outcasts are now the big city bourgeoisie

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girls of Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick – but we hold on
We’ll never falter, though they want us to slip – we hold on

The desperate, downtown stealing bikes
Drunks in the village are picking fights

So, police line the streets to read them their rights
No controlling hot summer nights
The sun goes down on the edge of town, at the end of everyday
We sit and watch the stack, on fire, to the east across the bay

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girls of Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick – but we hold on
We’ll never falter, though they want us to slip – we hold on

There’s something in the church belfry
At the corner of Victoria and King
And it screams out into the night
It sings this city’s plight

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girl on Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick – but we hold on
We’ll never falter, though they want us to slip – we hold on
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