Feral breath blues

(Solo harmonica intro — slow, bent notes, blue and tired)

🎵 waaah… wah—wahhh… wuhhh… 🎵

Verse 1 (spoken-sung, behind the beat)

The ones who went to jail

Either needed it

Or was mistaken

That’s just truth sittin’ where it land

But me—

I’m feral

Like the animals back home

Raised on instinct, not instruction

So think as you may

(harmonica answers, short jazz licks)

🎵 wah—wah… wuhh… 🎵

Verse 2 (looser, jazz cadence)

I don’t pace like a sinner

Or walk like I’m saved

I move how the creek moves

When nobody’s lookin’ that way

I learned silence from trees

And hunger from stone

Ain’t civilized enough for your rules

Too honest to fake what I owe

(harmonica slides, half-valve cries)

🎵 waaaah—wah—wahhh… 🎵

Chorus (call-and-response with harmonica)

You can judge me if you want

🎵 wahhh 🎵

Name me wild, name me wrong

🎵 wah—wah 🎵

I ain’t locked, I ain’t lost

🎵 wuhhh 🎵

I just don’t belong

I ain’t evil, I ain’t tame

🎵 wahhh—wahhh 🎵

I breathe free, I bite pain

🎵 WAAHH 🎵

Feral like the hills raised me

So think as you may

Harmonica Solo (jazz, wandering, almost conversational)

🎵 wah… wuhh… wah—wah—waaah…

🎵

🎵 short stabs… long bends… breath between notes 🎵

Verse 3 (low, reflective)

Cities put numbers on faces

Call it order, call it law

Back home, we just know who you are

By how you stand when you’re raw

Some cages are steel

Some are belief

I never fit either one

I survive off instinct and grief

(harmonica moans, minor key)

🎵 wahhh… wuhhh… 🎵

Chorus (quieter, cooler jazz feel)

The ones who went to jail

🎵 wahhh 🎵

Either needed it

🎵 wah—wah 🎵

Or was mistaken

🎵 wuhhh 🎵

But me—

🎵 waaah 🎵

I’m feral as the animals back home

🎵 wah—wah—wahhh 🎵

So think as you may

Extended Harmonica Solo (free jazz, emotional)

🎵 WAAAH—wah—wuhh—wahhh 🎵

🎵 breath cracks… bends cry… notes almost break 🎵

Outro (spoken, last breath)

I don’t need forgiveness

I don’t need a cell

Just air in my lungs

And room to be myself

(final harmonica note, held until it fades)

🎵 waaaaaah… 🎵

Verse 2 (jazz cadence, deliberate)

They don’t talk about the Panthers in the hollers

Black and white, standin’ side by side

Poor folks, coal dust, empty pockets

Same hunger in a different hide

They fed the kids, they named the pain

Said poverty ain’t a moral flaw

Almost bent the states the way Martin Luther King Jr. did

With words, with unity, with law

(harmonica bends, call-and-response phrasing)

🎵 wah—wah… wuhhh… 🎵

Pre-Chorus (quiet, pointed)

They don’t fear noise

They fear alignment

🎵 wahhh 🎵

They don’t crush riots

They crush movement

🎵 wah—wahhh 🎵

Chorus (cool jazz, no shouting)

Black Panther

White Panther

Same damn hunger, different skin

They almost changed the Appalachian states

Before the pressure closed back in

No halo, no headline praise

Just people tired of jail or bail

They buried the story, not the truth

So think as you may

(harmonica sings the hook, long bend)

🎵 waaaaaah… 🎵

Harmonica Solo I (wandering, reflective)

🎵 wah… wah—wuhh… wahhh… 🎵