Walkie Choir
Verse 1Plastic bricks with rubber antennas crackle in kids’ hands like budget magic wands
Channels half-filled with truckers, spooked neighbors
prank stations repeating the same dumb curse words for hours
Between the noise
that sweet click before a friend speaks
voice warped slightly by cheap circuitry
The sound that says you’re not alone in the dark
even if the power grid and every adult swears you are.
Verse 2Peak storm season
the sky bruises purple and green
interference riding lightning like a hitchhiker
Suddenly the radios sing in layered voices nobody in your group owns
Some speak your language with strange cadence
some chant number strings
some just breathe too close to the mic
You yank down the volume, yet you still hear it
thin and coiling around your spine.
Pre-ChorusKids improvise call signs
borrow them from comics, movies, inside jokes
The thing listening never shares its handle
just slips in and out of range like a shark fin in murky water.
ChorusWalkie choir howls across backyards and tree lines
Voices out of sync, some familiar
some wrong by a few degrees, You shout for your crew
hear them answer, hear something echo after them
noise takes harmony
bends it into a warning your bones understand before your brain keeps up.
BridgeYou pull batteries every night now
leave the radios gutted on your dresser
Twice they chirp anyway
LEDs winking weak hello in the dark, One night
half asleep, you answer without thinking
croak a greeting into dead plastic
The sound that comes back knows your full name
middle and all
like it stole it off a file in some other dimension’s cabinet.
ChorusWalkie choir howls across backyards and tree lines
Voices out of sync, some familiar
some wrong by a few degrees, You shout for your crew
hear them answer, hear something echo after them
noise takes harmony
bends it into a warning your bones understand before your brain keeps up.