Opal

RAW OPAL

Intro

There's a hollow in the mountain

Where the daylight doesn't reach

Past the roots of fallen timber

Past the last of all the trees

A man went down with a lantern

And a hammer at his side

There was something in the cavern

That the mountain couldn't hide

Verse 1

He found it in the wall

Half buried in the stone

A little color underneath

A crust of something old

He turned it in his hands

Held it up against the flame

It was rough around the edges

But the light was there the same

He took it from the mountain

Wrapped it up against the cold

And carried it through the pine trees

With no idea what it held

Instrumental – Low Bowed Cello, Fingerpicked Strings, Uneven Wooden Percussion

Verse 2

His hut stood in the timber

With the mountains at its back

An anvil by the fireplace

And his tools upon the rack

He laid the stone before him

And looked it over twice

One strike against the surface.

Nothing.

He tried again.

A crack.

Instrumental – Sudden Silence, Metallic Resonance, Dissonant Strings

Bridge

And something came alive.

Not from the fire.

Not from the lantern.

From the stone.

Red went running up the walls

Blue came spilling down the floor

Green was burning through the rafters

And the room was not the room anymore

There was fire without a flame

There was light without the sun

And the man who'd gone looking for a stone

Could hardly look at what he'd done

Instrumental – Shimmering Glass Harmonics, Layered Strings, Unfamiliar Choral Textures

Verse 3

He didn't touch it for a while.

Just watched.

Then he brought a bowl of water

And a cloth he'd used before

Took the dirt from every corner

Let it gather on the floor

And the colors kept on changing

With each little turn he made

There were pieces of the morning

In a stone he'd found in shade

Instrumental – Sparse Hammered Dulcimer, Bowed Viola

Final Verse

He made a place beside the window

Where the afternoon came through

Set the opal in a glass case

With the mountains still in view

And when he had a visitor

He'd take them down the hall

Show them what he'd brought back

From the cavern in the wall

They'd ask him what it cost him.

He'd say,

"A day's work."

Then he'd turn the glass toward the light

And let them look.

Instrumental – Brief Resonant String Figure, Natural Ending