Paper Wings Acoustic Piano

[INTRO] (instrumental, no vocal — allow space and breath) [VERSE 1] I’ve been counting all the quiet hours Between the truth and what we say Watching promises grow thinner Every time we look away I build my hopes from folded letters Words we never dared to send They feel lighter every morning Like they’re wearing toward the end [PRE-CHORUS] And I keep telling myself This is only just a phase But even faith gets tired Of standing in the rain [CHORUS] We were born with paper wings Trying hard not to tear Dreaming we could fly forever On love that wasn’t there Every fall feels soft at first Till the ground reminds us why We believed in paper wings And called it learning how to fly [VERSE 2] I hear laughter through the walls now Like a life I almost knew All the plans we left unfinished Still whisper me to you I wear bravery like makeup So no one sees the cost But even painted smiles can’t hide The shape of what we lost [PRE-CHORUS 2] I don’t blame the dreams for breaking They were never meant to stay But I wish we’d let them down A kinder way [CHORUS] We were born with paper wings Holding hope in fragile hands Every promise felt eternal Till it slipped like grains of sand Every fall feels soft at first Till the truth comes crashing through We believed in paper wings Because believing felt like truth [BRIDGE] I don’t need to be forgiven I don’t need to hear I’m right I just want to stop pretending This still keeps me warm at night (brief instrumental pause — guitar swell) [BUILD] If I let go of the memory Does that mean I let go of me? [FINAL CHORUS] We were born with paper wings And we loved them all the same Even fragile dreams have beauty Even love can leave a flame Every fall still teaches something Even loss can testify That we dared to lift our paper wings And tried [OUTRO] (softly, almost spoken) Some things aren’t meant to last… But they’re meant to matter. [music fades]