Defiance, Ohio - The White Shore lyrics
[Defiance, Ohio - The White Shore lyrics]
We grew up into lives scrawled
On back of mediated maps
In their lines invisibly entrapped
And this birthright, more like a birthmark
Whose area and edges grow ragged with age
A malignancy untested it consumes us anyway
It consumes us anyway it consumes us anyway
I grew up near the white shore
Without ever knowing that name
Just how lines starkly drawn will check
You in one box or another
And in the space between past and passing
We have classroom discussions of
Amy Tan novels but this is personal
Family is always personal
History is always personal
I will not condemn what anyone did to survive
But, I will not defend a
Culture that makes us decide
To assimilate or die
Or that defines survival as
Running as fast as you can from the places
You came from
Forgetting the things that have made us
Till all that is left is
The burning in your lungs
Or the pounding in your heart
That only has space for
Contempt for the ones who
Couldn't quite make it
That we are all the same: what a happy myth
Where race records become erased records
With time and meter to help us forget
Or to take away the sting
As we define survival as
Running as fast as we can from
The places we came from
Forgetting the things that have made us
Until all that is left is the
Burning in our lungs or
The pounding in our heart that
Only has space for contempt for the ones who
Couldn't quite make it
On back of mediated maps
In their lines invisibly entrapped
And this birthright, more like a birthmark
Whose area and edges grow ragged with age
A malignancy untested it consumes us anyway
It consumes us anyway it consumes us anyway
I grew up near the white shore
Without ever knowing that name
Just how lines starkly drawn will check
You in one box or another
And in the space between past and passing
We have classroom discussions of
Amy Tan novels but this is personal
Family is always personal
History is always personal
I will not condemn what anyone did to survive
But, I will not defend a
Culture that makes us decide
To assimilate or die
Or that defines survival as
Running as fast as you can from the places
You came from
Forgetting the things that have made us
Till all that is left is
The burning in your lungs
Or the pounding in your heart
That only has space for
Contempt for the ones who
Couldn't quite make it
That we are all the same: what a happy myth
Where race records become erased records
With time and meter to help us forget
Or to take away the sting
As we define survival as
Running as fast as we can from
The places we came from
Forgetting the things that have made us
Until all that is left is the
Burning in our lungs or
The pounding in our heart that
Only has space for contempt for the ones who
Couldn't quite make it