The Atheist's Burden

I caught a dawn chorus this morning,
And it was a show-stopper.
I'm rising early again, and it's great.
I took a Hell of a chance,
And it's paid off handsomely.
Now it looks like everything is right.

And the sky was deep blue, and the air was ice-cold.
I look at the sky quite a lot,
Don't you know?

'Cause I don't know what the future's got in store for me,
But it's gotta hold more than the past any day.

Now I don't care if the past has left marks on me
Who can't assess their own damage with their own two eyes?
God knows how we did it,
I guess we're all just scrabbling around in the dirt--
We just aim for the sky.

There's so much pessimism around that it's frightening--
Makes you wonder where it's all gonna end.
But if you get up real early--say 4:30--and look around,
You'll see the world before the cynics have got out of bed.