The Long Way Home

[Verse 1]

I kept your spare key in a wicker dish

Eight months of watering a plant you forgot

You called it ours

I called it mine alone

Every Tuesday I refilled the feeder

For a bird that had already gone

[Pre-Chorus]

Then the radiator started knocking in the night

Like someone asking to be let inside

[Chorus]

I am taking the long way

I am taking the long way home

Past the bakery past the laundromat

Where the women fold their lives in stacks

I am taking the long way

Just to see what I might find

A version of me that never learned to wait

Walking a different line

[Post-Chorus]

Round and round and round I go

Oh oh oh

Round and round and round

[Verse 2]

I found your handwriting on a grocery list

Parsley thyme and something I can't read

You always left the last word falling off

Like you were already halfway out the door

So I built a shelf where the dishes go

And I alphabetized my own CDs

[Pre-Chorus]

The neighbor's daughter asked me where you went

I said somewhere with better afternoon light

[Chorus]

I am taking the long way

I am taking the long way home

Past the bakery past the laundromat

Where the women fold their lives in stacks

I am taking the long way

Just to see what I might find

A version of me that never learned to wait

Walking a different line

[Post-Chorus]

Round and round and round I go

Oh oh oh

Round and round and round

[Bridge]

I threw the feeder in the bin

Watched the pigeons circle once and leave

I did not cry I did not call your sister

I just learned the city's other half

Turn by turn by turn

[Chorus]

Now I take the long way

Yes I take the long way home

Past the baker past the woman folding linen

Who nods at me like we have always known

I take the long way

And I am not looking for you

I am mapping every corner I ignored

Turns out I was the one who moved

[Post-Chorus]

Round and round and round I go

Oh oh oh

Round and round and round

I know exactly where I am

Oh oh oh

Round and round