New Nation

I know the new nation that we've been chasing Isn't all for waste, and I know you're here when I need you around But maybe I'd be stronger if I stayed longer Learning right from wrong, or The other thousand things that I'm figuring out I know the new nation that we've been chasing Isn't all for waste, and I know you're here when I need you around But maybe I'd be stronger if I stayed longer Learning right from wrong, or The other thousand things that I'm figuring out She loves the morning She loves every part of the day, but especially the morning I think it's in the artistic redemption The quiet call to lift eyelids and skylids The second chances The third chances The fourth chances And of all the people who might petition God for another chance She has a case A case of trophies boasting of the ways she used to move Used to sing, used to A case of empty bottles and ziplock backs Testifying to the ways she had been used And a case of book after wisdom after book Bought to be borrowed and we do Her name is J For the joy that she gives For the jewel that she is For the Jazz that she lives She's bright in every sense of the word She's bright because of The Word And her light is my morning I know the new nation that we've been chasing Isn't all for waste, and I know you're here when I need you around Maybe I'd be stronger if I stayed longer Learning right from wrong, or The other thousand things that I'm figuring out How humbling it is that a third of our lifetime is untouchable Are we so fragile that for every 16 hours of movement We require eight of stillness? Is the world so heavy that by our dying day we cannot lift it? Are we so in danger of thinking ourselves invincible That we must be reintroduced to weakness on a nightly basis? I think so I think often about this Especially as I watch her 24 hours trimmed further and further down Until the ratio is flipped, leaving only one third for her use That one third in all its discomfort brings a comfort Better yet, a Life Like nothing I've seen in all my waking hours From the heart of the storm From the confusion of the worn A Revolution has been born One that will outlive every sunset Until the day there is no sunset And everything is as the son said (Who-ah-oh) I know the new nation that we've been chasing Isn't all for waste, and I know you're here when I need you around But maybe I'd be stronger if I stayed longer Learning right from wrong, or The other thousand things that I'm figuring out