Emerald Street

Pregnant teens on the Barton street bus
Hard-up people living off crust
And there's a beat-up town car it's starting to ruse
Hard soles are kicking up dust

Half a million people living in the corpse
Of the brown brick 50's
To the north, all the small town outcasts
Are now big city bourgeoisie

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girls of Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick
But we hold on
We'll never falter, though they want us to slip
We hold on

Desperate downtown stealing bikes
Drunks in the village are picking fights
So police like the streets, read them their rights
No controlling hot summer nights

The sun goes down on the edge of town
At the end of everyday
We sit and watch the stacks on fire
To the east across the bay

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girls of Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick
But we hold on
We'll never falter, though they want us to slip
We hold on

There's something in the church belfry
On the corner of Victoria and King
And it screams out into the night
It sings this city's plight

All the boys in the halfway houses
Wave to the girls of Emerald Street

Our calloused fingers, blood red on the brick
But we hold on
We'll never falter, though they want us to slip
We hold on