Found it under spare cables
in a box I never marked
Black paper gone soft at the corners
silver dust across the dark
Nova laughing by the van door
Kade asleep against an amp
Me pretending not to notice
someone caught me in the frame
There was Lyra with her sticks crossed
behind her neck beneath the light
Lucien halfway in the doorway
already listening to the night
Vanta staring past the camera
like she planned to disappear
All of us inside one cheap shot
before leaving had a price
I ran my thumb across the faces
felt the paper start to bend
Some things don’t survive you
Some things refuse to end
Rust on the rail
dust in the grain
A blown-out chord
still holding our names
I thought I left
that whole life alone
But every page
kept dragging it home
No clean return
no debt fully paid
The shape I left
and what stayed
One shot outside the rehearsal room
rain turning coats nearly black
Someone wrote last show underneath it
We never knew which one they meant
Kade had coffee on the console
Nova had blood upon her sleeve
I had one boot through the doorway
making leaving look easy
There were rooms we nearly ruined
songs we buried under noise
Every photograph looked peaceful
because photographs have no voice
But I remember every argument
every silence after sound
How I used to stare down at my feet
and mutter at the ground
I said the band was just a building
I said I only left a room
Then an old picture proved
I had taken all of you
Rust on the rail
dust in the grain
A blown-out chord
still holding our names
I thought I left
that whole life alone
But every page
kept dragging it home
No clean return
no debt fully paid
The shape I left
and what stayed
I used to stare at my boots
like the floor could keep a secret
Used to think silence meant
nobody could reach it
Now the afternoon sun
cuts straight through the room
Hits every face in that album
and wakes up the dust
We looked alive
Maybe that was enough
I closed the book
then opened it again
Not looking for forgiveness
Not trying to be friends
No reunion in the kitchen
No grand return to stage
Just proof that we were really there
before we turned the page
I still hear the train line
beyond the factory wall
Same iron rhythm underneath
every rise and every fall
It does not make me whole
It does not make things right
It only keeps the old names moving
through another night
Rust on the rail
dust in the grain
A blown-out chord
still holding our names
I thought I left
that whole life alone
But every page
kept dragging it home
No clean return
no debt fully paid
The shape I left
and what stayed
I kept the album
That’s all