VERSE 1 There’s a drumbeat in the distance, but it don’t sound like peace It’s the echo of a country falling down upon its knees Where the uniforms salute a power they should fear And the ones we chose to lead us won’t speak loud enough to hear VERSE 2 There’s a badge upon a chest that once meant truth above the law Now it follows shadows blindly, never stopping to recall That justice isn’t justice when it bows before a throne And the scales that once were balanced now are breaking stone by stone CHORUS Oh, the dream is burning slow In the ashes, embers glow We were promised something brighter But the night keeps taking hold If we don’t stand, if we don’t scream We’ll lose the last of what we’ve been This is how a nation crumbles This is how the dream ends VERSE 3 There’s a courthouse on a hill where truth once held the floor Now the doors are cracked and splintered like they can’t hold back the war And the robed ones at the summit carve the future with a blade Cutting paths that lead to ruin in the rulings that they’ve made VERSE 4 Lines on maps are twisted like a serpent in the grass Stealing voices from the people as the years keep slipping past And the vote that built a country now is bent until it breaks While the architects of power redraw freedom for their sake CHORUS Oh, the dream is burning slow In the ashes, embers glow We were promised something brighter But the night keeps taking hold If we don’t stand, if we don’t scream We’ll lose the last of what we’ve been This is how a nation crumbles This is how the dream ends BRIDGE But a whisper can be thunder when enough of us believe And a spark becomes a wildfire when the silent finally speak If the dream is worth the saving, then the cost is standing tall ’Cause a country isn’t dying if its people won’t let it fall FINAL CHORUS Oh, the dream is burning slow But the embers still can glow If we rise instead of bowing If we fight for what we know We can stand, we can scream We can resurrect the dream.