Busy in the backyard
I growing basil
Pluck tomatoes from the vine
Simmer them soft
Make the gravy
Feed the family at dinner time
When I was called to duty
I fell in happily
With my brave sisters on the line
We painted so precisely
The glowing dials on watches
How delicate the face of time
In a past life
We were radium girls
And our hair used to glow
From a different type of halo
With all the good men overseas
Silhouettes of smokestacks
Girls in factories
We found the undark in the work
We tipped that brush onto our tongue
Ingested tiny drops of poison
♪
Some of those girls painted their toes and fingernails
To make their nights light up like the day
Oh, the brighter, the luminescence, oh, the faster the decay
When I looked down the line
My sisters, disappearing
One by one, their bright faces gone
Their crumbling jaws exposing
The ugliness of war
How delicate the face of time
In a past life
We were radium girls
And our hair used to glow
From a different type of halo
With all the good men overseas
But the death toll rising here
And silhouettes of smokestacks and factories
Why did I survive
And is the poison buried deep
Inside my family's bones
And if I sing their sins
Will you turn it into medicine
Oh, what will break the spell
I wanna know
In a past life
We were radium girls
And our hair used to glow
From a different type of halo
With all the good men overseas
Silhouettes of smokestacks
Ghosts in factories
We were the light in darker days
We tipped that brush onto our tongue
We tried to keep you all so safe from harm