The Motel Testament

Check-in counter flickered blue The key chain rattled like a warning Room 7 with a broken view And a bible in the drawer that morning Pages yellow, spines were cracked Names scratched in with ballpoint pens Every stranger left a track Looking for somewhere to start again I traced each name with my thumb Wondering which one was yours The ones that blurred, the ones that slipped away The ones that stopped behind closed doors Every page was just a name Nobody wrote the ending Just enough to break your heart Not enough to know the rest In this motel bible Names fade underneath the years I wrote mine on the final line And closed the book Somebody signed in '89 A cursive Mary with a shaky hand Another one from '99 Just initials I couldn't understand I wondered what they left behind A promise, a lie, or a wedding band Did they drive away and find Something worth more than they planned I thought about your name a while Then stopped before I wrote Somewhere between those other names I found my own instead Every page was just a name Nobody wrote the ending Just enough to break your heart Not enough to know the rest In this motel bible Names fade underneath the years I wrote mine on the final line And closed the book Outside, the trucks roll through the dark The neon hums above the road Some stories disappear completely Some just slowly lose their hold Every page was just a name Nobody wrote the ending Just enough to break your heart Not enough to know the rest In this motel bible Names fade underneath the years I wrote mine on the final line And closed the book I closed the book I closed the book And drove away