Lyric

There's a light on in the university

There's a freight train rolling slow

Somewhere men are moving borders

On a map I'll never know

And I'm standing in the mud again

With the whole damn world above

They call it power, they call it progress—

I call it what it costs the ones you love

I was up before the sunrise

With a key ring on my side

Polished floors for people with futures

Kept my questions locked inside

Dad said, “Son, don't make a target

Out of everything you see

We ain't got the kind of money

That can buy a little mercy.”

Mama counted every dollar

Dali counted boxes at the store

Some came stamped from south of Texas

Some from ships across the ocean floor

Nobody asked the hands that packed them

What flag they wanted on the wall

They just wanted work come Monday

Wanted enough to feed us all

Now the screens are full of dragons

And the eagle's spread its wings

Every suit has got an answer

Every answer sells something

But the men who draw the lines

Never stand where the rain comes through

They don't know the weight of living

On the wrong side of a point of view

The eagle and the dragon

Two giants in the sky

They can shake the earth beneath us

They can tell us who's the bad guy

But they don't walk these streets at daybreak

They don't know the rent is due

They draw the lines in rooms of glass—

We walk the mud they never knew

The eagle and the dragon

Let the mighty make their plans

I ain't asking for a kingdom

I just want a chance to stand

Emily was born beneath these stars

Same rain falling on her street

Still they asked her where her loyalty lay

Before they asked her what she believed

She learned to hear the question hiding

Behind a smile, behind a name

How a face can turn to evidence

How a birthplace turns to blame

On the news they called me genius

Like the word could clean my hands

They never saw me mop the stairwells

Never knew my father's plans

They put my life inside a headline

Put my silence on a screen

Made a weapon of a question

I was only trying to keep clean

Now the cameras want a witness

And the markets want a mind

Politicians want a symbol

They can wave and leave behind

One side says I'm proof of freedom

One side says I'm proof of fear

Both of them keep talking for me

Neither one can hear me here

The eagle and the dragon

Two giants in the sky

They can shake the earth beneath us

They can tell us who's the bad guy

But they don't walk these streets at daybreak

They don't know the rent is due

They draw the lines in rooms of glass—

We walk the mud they never knew

The eagle and the dragon

Let the mighty make their plans

I ain't asking for a kingdom

I just want a chance to stand

[Slide Guitar, Harmonica, Drums Gradually Enter]

There's a number in a ledger

There's a name behind a door

There's a model making guesses

About what people will endure

They say the future's just a pattern

Just a risk you can control

But a man ain't just a data point

And a country ain't a soul for sale

I don't know who's holding every string

I don't know who's clean or bought

But I know when truth gets buried

Somebody pays for what they thought

So I wrote down what was certain

Kept the rumors in their place

FACT and fear ain't the same thing

And a theory ain't a case

I don't hate the people overseas

I don't worship those at home

I have seen a good man lose his job

For a war he didn't own

I've seen a mother hide her worry

Seen a father bite his tongue

Seen a kid become a headline

Before his life had just begun

If the truth is worth defending

Let it stand without a flag

If a man is worth believing

Let him speak without a tag

Don't call me your salvation

Don't call me your enemy

I'm the one who cleans the floor

You keep pretending not to see

The eagle and the dragon

Two giants in the sky

They can shake the earth beneath us

They can sell us reasons why

But they don't walk these streets at daybreak

They don't know what people lose

They draw the lines in rooms of glass—

We walk the mud they never knew

The eagle and the dragon

Let the mighty make their plans

I ain't asking for a kingdom

I just want a chance to stand

And if the world comes down between them

If the truth gets lost in noise

Remember there are lives beneath it—

Not just numbers, not just toys

The university lights are fading

The freight train's rolling through

I got work again tomorrow

And the mud is still here, too