Georgia

There’s a word for missing places that can never be the same
And I can’t find it on my tongue now, but it echoes in my brain
And I never knew that ghost towns could feel quite this way
Alive for everybody else but I feel empty just the same

But I know it like I know how the carpet stains with clay
Rust red from the iron running through it, like it’s running in my veins
As far as second chances, guess you all could rewrite your fate
But I know that when I die, I’ll be the last one of my name

So lay me down in the water when the creek is running clear
Baptize me with the crawfish and the catfish and the deer
And it was never quite that simple, but it’s held there in my mind
It was Georgia, yea it was mine

I have my father’s stubborn blood and my mother’s anxious mind
I am the last remaining monument to things we’ve lost in time
And though there’s fresh new paint and finishings these walls could never lie
They hold the remnants of a family from a not-so-distant life

Sometimes there’s questions you don’t ask for fear of learning who was right
For fear of seeing that the world was never neatly black and white
They say redemption isn’t something you could ever earn or buy
But Earth’s a bare-knuckle boxing match, a winner-take-all fight

So may we rise like the mountains where they’re whispering of gold
No, they may not be the highest, but they’re gentle and they’re old
And you can’t want it when you have it, but I'm missing it with time
It was Georgia, yea it was mine