Someday Satellite

Song Lyrics – 2002

You packed your books in a secondhand box
Faded denim and a tear in your sock
You smiled like you were brave enough
But I saw your hands were shaking
Your map had stars drawn in red
Said, “It’s just a while, not the end”
You kissed my hair and laughed too soft
Like you were scared of breaking

Now you’re chasing skies in another town
And I’m still spinning in this dusty crowd

But I believe in gravity
Even when it pulls you far from me
Like a someday satellite
You’ll come back into my light
Even if the night feels long
I’ll hold your echo in a song
We’re not lost, just waiting right
For our orbit to align

I ride my bike past the movie screen
Where we first kissed behind the vending machine
I keep your letters in my guitar case
Like pressed leaves from a summer dream
The girls say “Move on, you’re too young to wait”
But they don’t know your voice still sounds like fate

And you said love like this don’t fade
It just sleeps until it’s safe

Yeah, I believe in gravity
Even when it pulls you far from me
Like a someday satellite
You’ll come back into my light
Even if the night feels long
I’ll hold your echo in a song
We’re not lost, just waiting right
For our orbit to align

Maybe you’ll be someone wild and free
Maybe I’ll be braver than I used to be
But if the stars remember how we burned
Then someday, baby, you’ll return

‘Cause I still believe in gravity
Even if it takes eternity
Like a someday satellite
You’ll drift back into my light
Even if the world moves on
I’ll still hum your favorite song
We’re not gone, just out of sight
Waiting for our orbit to align

Author’s Note

I wrote this song in my early twenties, back when young love felt huge enough to swallow the whole sky. I was listening to a lot of Mazzy Star and Sarah Masen then, trying to figure out how to make something dreamy and honest at the same time. There’s a little Everclear in here, too… that raw, straightforward ache that comes from being just old enough to know love can hurt, but still young enough to believe distance can’t break it.

The narrator is a girl watching someone she cares about leave, holding onto this stubborn hope that the universe is big but not big enough to keep them apart forever. It’s nostalgic now, looking back at the person I was when I wrote it. Someone who believed in gravity and destiny and the way people drift back into each other’s lives. Posting it here feels a bit like opening an old guitar case and finding a memory still humming inside.

Photo: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory