Kerosene fingers trace the brass
Vellum breathes in glass-walled class
Tide charts folded in oak drawers
Escapement clicks through salty hours
Two hands wind what weather devours
Salt in the gears keeps grinding slow
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Pendulum swings where lanterns burned
Every tick a lesson learned
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Logbook ink bleeds through onion skin
Mainspring sings where storms begin
Apprentice ears catch bronze resonance
Keeper's ghost tends the lens
Time keeps counsel in silence
Salt in the gears keeps grinding slow
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Pendulum swings where lanterns burned
Every tick a lesson learned
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Crank the weight through hempen rope
Archives hold what oceans wrote
Cog teeth mesh with patient grace
Salt crust blooms on brass face
Neither voice asks for quarter
Foghorn low in copper throat
Spring unwinds the morning note
No savior in the winding key
Just the dark and you and me
Quill scratches margin, steady hand
Latitude marked by grain of sand
Voice one charts the turning screw
Voice two reads the dark blue
Both know what the deep won't tell
Salt in the gears keeps grinding slow
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Pendulum swings where lanterns burned
Every tick a lesson learned
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Final winding, night watch ends
Logbook closed on salt-stained friends
Telecaster fades to harmonic ring
Last tick hangs on a single string
Salt remains when voices cease
Salt in the gears keeps grinding slow
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Pendulum swings where lanterns burned
Every tick a lesson learned
Salt in the gears won't let us go
Brass sleeps in the basement dark
Tide turns on its hidden mark