[Intro — spoken, barely above a whisper] They tell you leave it at the gate. Clock out. Go home. Be normal. But the gate don't close on the inside. God… can you hear me?
[Verse 1] God, can you hear me? I've been silent so long my throat forgot how to scream Twenty years behind walls, counting bodies and counts Watching men rot in cages while I held it together somehow I was the law, I was the order, I was the one with the keys But nobody told me the locks would follow me home Nobody warned me about the dreams
I wake up in a cold sweat, back in the block
Heart pounding like a CO knock at 3 AM
My hands still remember the restraints, the rage
The faces of men I processed like numbers on a page
I told myself I did my time clean, I did my job right
But righteousness don't protect you from the residue of that life
God, can you hear me?
'Cause I'm screaming in a frequency nobody else receives
[Chorus] God, can you hear me? I'm standing at attention but there's nobody in command God, can you hear me? I built my life on duty — now I don't know where I stand I carried other men's burdens through corridors of concrete and steel And I never asked for mercy 'cause mercy wasn't part of the deal God, can you hear me? …can you hear me?
[Verse 2] I've seen men cry out to you from six-by-nine cells Hands pressed to the glass, eyes closed, lips moving — still And I'd stand there watching, doing my rounds, doing my job Wondering if you answered them — wondering why I never called
What does that make me?
The man on the outside of the prayer?
The one with the uniform and the radio
But the same hollow stare?
I don't talk about it — that's the code, that's the culture
You process what happened, you file it, you move on
But moving on don't mean it's gone
It just means you got better at carrying the weight
Like an inmate serving forever
Just counting days
God, can you hear me?
Because the silence coming back is getting harder to take
[Chorus] God, can you hear me? I'm standing at at
