[Intro]
[Hammond organ breathes three slow descending notes over brushed drums.]

One box of robes.
One bent gold frame.
God of storms.
Tenant of shame.

[Verse 1]
They stacked my life beside the rail,
A cracked blue cup, a coat, some mail.
The landlord red the clause aloud;
No gods exempt, no indoor cloud.
My mattress leaned against the wall,
My throne was masking tape, that’s all.
At six the early workers came
And stepped around my boxes and my name.

[Chorus]
God of storms, tenant of shame,
No throne beneath me, no roof to claim.
The pipes stay quiet when I speak my name;
The dawn comes pale, but never tame.
God of storms, tenant of shame—
For once the wreckage knows who came.

[Verse 2]
Old Mr. Klein brought bitter tea,
Set down the cup, then looked at me.
I waited for a mocking phrase;
He only said, “You’ve had rough days.”
His kindness felt too small to fight,
Too plain to turn to wrong or right.
I asked why he was not afraid.
He said, “Fear never made your damage paid.”

[Pre-Chorus]
Below, the washers found their spin;
No hymn arose, no bells came in.
The world resumed its modest frame
Around a god reduced to name.

[Chorus]
God of storms, tenant of shame,
No throne beneath me, no roof to claim.
The pipes stay quiet when I speak my name;
The dawn comes pale, but never tame.
God of storms, tenant of shame—
For once the wreckage knows who came.

[Instrumental]
[Electric guitar bends one note at a time while the organ sustains the stairwell melody.]

[Verse 3]
I opened one old wooden case
And found a coin with my young face.
The jaw was hard, the forehead high,
The hand reached upward toward the sky.
I turned it over. On the back,
A kneeling crowd beneath attack.
I once called that design respect;
Tonight it looked like fear’s own architect.

[Bridge]
The shame was not the borrowed floor,
The cardboard crown, the bolted door.
It was the tea I had not earned,
The homes I shook, the bridges burned.
A king can lose his gold and land;
A man can lose the offered hand.

[Final Chorus]
God of storms, tenant of shame,
The boxes know my given name.
No throne beneath me, no one to blame;
The smoke on the ceiling records the flame.
God of storms, tenant of shame—
I finally answer when they ask who came.
Not fate, not Hera, not age, not rain:
Zeus caused the storm. Zeus bears the stain.

[Outro]
[Brushes stop while the Hammond holds one unresolved chord.]

Mr. Klein takes back the cup.
The sun comes in.
I look up.