[Intro — bass + oud + cello + string pad build] (low, spoken-sung tenor) Watch. My beautiful. My wicked. Watch them fall. [Verse 1 — oud shadowing bass, cello melodic, string pad, prepared piano accents] You paint the mouth. You choose the eye. You lay the poison thin. I watch the god you'll be tonight begin, and then begin. Your painted hands compose a face more real than any made by chance. The given face was accident. The made one is your stance. [Pre-Chorus — modular synth glitches enter, oud ornament, reese synth building] The lamps are low. The mirrors kept. The wanting has begun. So go on — go on, my fleur du mal — and ruin every one. [Chorus — oud counter-melody + cello melodic + reese synth doubling bass + string pad thick + prepared piano + big-choir stack] Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — wear the mask I love the most. (falsetto stack) Every beholder a communion, every glance a raised host. Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — let them ache for what you wear. (falsetto stack) The painted face is heaven. The given face was air. [Post-Chorus — density continues, oud sustains, modular glitches] (fleur du mal, fleur du mal) (oh — mm — oh) [Verse 2 — oud escalating, cello + prepared piano thickens, glitches active] You crossed the room in slow procession, every eye a caught small thing. Not a beholder in the house survived the way you made them sing. They took the paint for flesh. They took the pose for real. They read you as the given, and they missed the maker's seal. [Pre-Chorus 2 — oud leads in, reese synth surge, string pad thickens] The lamps come up. The mirrors close. The room has come undone. So go on — go on, my fleur du mal — be everything they've won. [Chorus — WALL OF SOUND: oud + cello + reese + string pad + prepared piano + glitches + big-choir stack] Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — wear the mask I love the most. (falsetto stack) Every beholder a communion, every glance a raised host. Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — let them ache for what you wear. (falsetto stack) The painted face is heaven. The given face was air. [Bridge — kick and hats drop, oud + cello + prepared piano lead, bass holds, glitches whisper] They will tell you nature's honored. It's fallen ground. The rouge, the powder, the studied line — the only holy sound. They call the paint deception. It is priesthood — it is decree. The maker of the mask is closer to the god than what came free. [Build — everything ramps: oud ascending run, reese synth surge, string pad swell, glitches proliferate] Go on, my fleur du mal — walk out and burn the room. (rising falsetto) The made face is the truer face. Go — and make it bloom. [Final Chorus — MAX MAX: all instruments at ceiling, big-choir stack in fifths and octaves, oud melisma over the top] Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — wear the mask I love the most. (full falsetto stack) Every beholder a communion, every glance a raised host. Fleur du mal, fleur du mal — let them ache for what you wear. (full falsetto stack) The painted face is heaven. The given face was air. [Outro — layers drop off one by one, oud descending phrase, cello sustains last, elastic snap fade] Fleur du mal, fleur du mal. The painted mouth. The chosen eye. The whole exquisite pose. You are the god you painted — and every given face was prose. (one oud pluck. one elastic snap.)
