A girl stands quiet at the gate. She’s learned to wait, and wait, and wait.
An American Reckoning
Verse 1 – The Builders
They built a house and called it right. Said work would save. Locked it tight. They prayed, they fought, they raised a flag— Then left it folded in a bag. They gave us rules without a name. They passed the torch, then blamed the flame.
Refrain
They handed down what they denied— The pride, the debt, the quiet lie.
Verse 2 – The Inheritors
We lived in rooms with broken beams. Hung pictures up to hide the seams. We fixed what shook with borrowed nails. Believed their wins, ignored their fails. We sang their songs, forgot the words— And told ourselves we’d made it home.
Refrain
We carried more than just a name— The debt, the weight, the buried shame.
Bridge – The Reckoning
What kind of man came out of this? All talk, no ground. All wound, no fix. Strong in noise, small in stand. Took the tools, refused the work. We dressed it up. We looked away. We called it new. It stayed the same.
Verse 3 – The Witnesses
A girl stands quiet at the gate. She’s learned to wait, and wait, and wait. We tell her, “Build,” then hand the wreck— The weight we named, but won’t address. We say, “It’s yours. Now make it true.” And walk away like we came through.
Final Chorus
We held the torch. We watched it burn. We left her nothing she could learn. No song to sing. No name to trust. The house still stands. The fault’s the same.
Gene Scott grew up on a tenant farm in Sheffield, Illinois, where strip mines swallowed the prairie and Euclid trucks hauled coal past the kitchen window. His father welded for International Harvester winters and pulled hogs from collapsed mine shafts. His mother drove a hundred miles round-trip to Bradley University three days a week, graduated with honors, and never let them miss a meal. Scott earned degrees from Illinois and Missouri, married Lana Ferguson on her family’s front porch in Hancock County—the oldest residence in the county, where her Confederate ancestor is buried at the edge of the woods—and raised a son in the Appalachian foothills. His writing draws on Midwestern magical realism, generational memory, and the stories told around oak kitchen tables where stoker men and snake women once drank coffee.
Gene Scott
Gene Scott grew up on an Illinois tenant farm where kitchen-table tales mixed magic with hog farms and strip mines. After 40 years in East Tennessee, he’s witnessed nature’s raw power—and its quiet grace to heal what’s broken.
The Inheritance
A girl stands quiet at the gate.
She’s learned to wait, and wait, and wait.
An American Reckoning
Verse 1 – The Builders
They built a house and called it right.
Said work would save. Locked it tight.
They prayed, they fought, they raised a flag—
Then left it folded in a bag.
They gave us rules without a name.
They passed the torch, then blamed the flame.
Refrain
They handed down what they denied—
The pride, the debt, the quiet lie.
Verse 2 – The Inheritors
We lived in rooms with broken beams.
Hung pictures up to hide the seams.
We fixed what shook with borrowed nails.
Believed their wins, ignored their fails.
We sang their songs, forgot the words—
And told ourselves we’d made it home.
Refrain
We carried more than just a name—
The debt, the weight, the buried shame.
Bridge – The Reckoning
What kind of man came out of this?
All talk, no ground. All wound, no fix.
Strong in noise, small in stand.
Took the tools, refused the work.
We dressed it up. We looked away.
We called it new. It stayed the same.
Verse 3 – The Witnesses
A girl stands quiet at the gate.
She’s learned to wait, and wait, and wait.
We tell her, “Build,” then hand the wreck—
The weight we named, but won’t address.
We say, “It’s yours. Now make it true.”
And walk away like we came through.
Final Chorus
We held the torch. We watched it burn.
We left her nothing she could learn.
No song to sing. No name to trust.
The house still stands. The fault’s the same.
Gene Scott grew up on a tenant farm in Sheffield, Illinois, where strip mines swallowed the prairie and Euclid trucks hauled coal past the kitchen window. His father welded for International Harvester winters and pulled hogs from collapsed mine shafts. His mother drove a hundred miles round-trip to Bradley University three days a week, graduated with honors, and never let them miss a meal. Scott earned degrees from Illinois and Missouri, married Lana Ferguson on her family’s front porch in Hancock County—the oldest residence in the county, where her Confederate ancestor is buried at the edge of the woods—and raised a son in the Appalachian foothills. His writing draws on Midwestern magical realism, generational memory, and the stories told around oak kitchen tables where stoker men and snake women once drank coffee.
Gene Scott