Concrete Rosary

Sunrise on Charbonnet.

Cold air smell like jasmine and diesel.

Somebody sweeping front steps in 4/4 time.

That’s the first prayer of the day.

(Drums kick in — slow shuffle with snare ghost notes.)

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🎶

Count my rosary in red brick dust,

Each stone a story, each scratch a trust.

Mama said faith ain’t somethin’ you wear,

It’s somethin’ you carry when the world ain’t fair.

Got a saint on my chain, he look like me,

Halo crooked, but the soul still free.

Say my Hail Marys on the corner beat,

Tap the cross where the sidewalk meet.

🎶

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🎶

Concrete rosary, pray where you stand,

Dust on my fingers, hope in my hand.

Every crack got a hallelujah sound,

Heaven ain’t up — it’s underground.

🎶

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🎶

The block my cathedral, paint peelin’ gold,

Every verse a votive, every breath bold.

I don’t kneel on pews, I kneel on curbs,

And still get forgiveness in the same few words.

I seen angels in Aprons, cookin’ red beans,

Heard God in a horn solo split between scenes.

The streets been holy since the drums was born,

You ain’t lost your way — you just been reborn.

🎶

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Tu es là, même dans la poussière,

You are here, even in the dust.

Mon Dieu, la terre te chante,

My God, the earth still sings of You.

🎶

(Trumpet echoes like a choir response.)

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🎶

Concrete rosary, born from pain,

Prayer in the pothole, grace in the rain.

Don’t need no robe, just a heart that beat,

Each chain clink a saint on repeat.

🎶

(Batiste adds syncopated piano stabs and a second-line swing.)

⸻

I ain’t perfect. But I’m purpose.

The streets taught me that faith don’t float — it walks.

You trip, you fall, you get up swingin’.

That’s a prayer too.

🎶

I count my rosary in rhymes I spit,

Each one a stone God ain’t done with yet.

🎶

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Concrete rosary, built on pain,

Shine through dust, survive the rain.

We ain’t just pray — we prove it, see,

Every beat a blessing, every block a bead.

🎶

⸻

(Faint children laughing, birds waking, horn warming up.)

Morning light hit the sidewalk like a stained-glass window.

That’s how you know God still got a studio in the city.

(Soft trumpet fade — the last note hangs like a hallelujah.)