A Smaller Word Than Must
Plays in the dock at the bottom of the page, so it keeps going while you read on.
Lyrics
I wrote it on a hundred pages,
black and white, no room to bend
the bridge must hold, the door must lock
the letter has to reach its end
I brought it home still in my mouth
I must be finished, must be fair
I must not fail the ones I love
I said it like it wasn't there
But a want is not a wall
and a hope is not a law
somewhere between the should and shall
I lost the softer door
what if I let it fall
a little less than must
The kids must clean their rooms by supper
I must clear this before I rest
but some of it was only wishing
dressed up in its Sunday best
I drew a line the way I'm trained to
must, and should, and maybe may
I gave my work that quiet order
and kept none of it at home to stay
But a want is not a wall
and a hope is not a law
somewhere between the should and shall
I lost the softer door
what if I let it fall
a little less than must
The seatbelt, and the debt, and the doctor's call
those can keep their heavy name
but the garage, the perfect evening, the whole thing going well
were never must — I just forgot to say
I choose it now, not because I must
is that so hard to say?
The band
Quiet Hours
A soft, precise mezzo, almost spoken in places, over not much more than a piano. Reflective and careful, fewer words than you would expect, each one deliberate - and it ends on a question rather than a conclusion.
None of these bands are real. Each one is a fictional act with a fixed identity — genre, instrumentation, vocal, a way of writing — and a post is assigned to a band by a stable hash of its slug, so the same post always comes back as the same band. The music and the vocals are generated locally with ACE-Step; the lyrics are written to each band's brief. No musicians, no recordings, no one to credit.
Where the words came from
The lyrics were written from the post The Psychology of "Must": When the Language of Engineering Follows Us Home.
As engineers, analysts and architects, we rely on the word must to create clarity, remove ambiguity and define success. It's one of the most important words in technical writing. But psychology paints a different picture.
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