The first thing you learn
Is grieving and loss
'Cause you can't return
To the safe place you lost
From your mother's womb
Into the chaos of the cold hospital room
When you're a child
They say, "Follow the rules"
And they send you to church
And they drop you at school
And your little heart breaks
As you're watching them both drive away
And I cried on the side of the curb
Yeah, the panic set in, and it hurt
Oh, but that's just the way that it works
The way of the world
As you're growing up
You get faced with the truth
That your parents are people
And messed up like you
And the child inside them
Is broken and still hurting too
You get to the end
When your time's almost done
With your skin paper-thin
And your bones giving up
From the very beginning
You've been going against the wind
And your body goes back to the Earth
And your soul to the whole universe
God, I hope that's the way that it works
The way of the world
From the very first moment it hurts
'Til the day that you're laid in the dirt
Yeah, but that's just the way that it works
The way of the world
The way of the world
Mm
'Til the day that you're laid in the dirt
Yeah, but that's just the way it works
The way of the world
Mm, mm