Work Text:
When I was a child, my father would sing
Sing of his family, the lives that they shared
Living in space on the ships and the asteroids
And mining all day for their air
When I was an infant, he brought me here with him
My bones grew up thick in the gravity well
"We're born to live free on a planet," he told me
"And if they don't see, they can all go to hell"
CHORUS
We'll never be slaves on a world of our making
We'll build our own mountains, our fields, and our sky
Through shadow and starlight we'll stand and fall proudly
Our bones will rest with our kin when we die
When I was a young man, I dreamed of the future
And gazed through our dome at the jagged pale land
To terraform worlds is a task that moves slowly
The time that it takes grinding mountains to sand
"In six generations, our contract is over,"
Is what Father said as we bent in the heat
"We'll grow our own food and we'll mine our own metals
And we'll own all the things that fall under our feet
CHORUS
We'll never be slaves on a world of our making
We'll build our own mountains, our fields, and our sky
Through shadow and starlight we'll stand and fall proudly
Our bones will rest with our kin when we die
When I was a woman, the shuttles stopped coming
We sent out our signals and got no reply
The songs that the void sang fell dead and fell silent
And we were abandoned never knowing why
Planets and dreams die alike, they die slowly
Failures take years but the years hurry by
My people are starving and dreamworn and lonely
And some still send pleas to an uncaring sky
I look to the cruel sun, the land chill and barren
Cursing the dead dust and swarf we called ours
The engines spin down for the last time this morning
I think of his family somewhere in the stars
Now I am so old, and the last of my family
The planet-dream's fading, and fading am I
But now comes a stranger with hard-handed kindness
Who says she will leave not one thing here to die
I've never seen space, or a world lush with springtime
My father told stories but that's all they are
My life is a dome and the terraform engines
And wearing a mask 'neath an unyielding star
She spins us a future, a new dream to grasp at
A world with no contracts, no debts, and no slaves
"We'll build it together, we lost and abandoned"
I look to my home and I see only graves
My father is long dead and now I am happy
His dream of a planet and freedom will keep
Now: death or a stranger? His bones or a promise?
I hope I chose right when I wake from my sleep
CHORUS
We'll never be slaves on a world of our making
We'll build our own mountains, our fields, and our sky
Through shadow and starlight we'll stand and fall proudly
Our bones will rest with our kin when we die
***
When I was a child, my father would sing
Sing of a prison his family escaped
When the Captain she came with a dream and a promise
And took them along on the strength of her faith
Now we are Preservation, we rise in the morning
To build a world that will be owned by no man
And the first generation, we still sing their stories
Our bones will all rest in this same welcome land