Dirty Hands (Maris)

[Verse 1, low, intimate, worn but steady] I know the blood before I know the name The street, the wound, the fever, all the same The city takes, the city leaves you bare So I bend low and find the broken there No velvet gloves, no silver saintly light Just thread and flame and hands that work at night If mercy lives, it does not stay clean It walks the gutters where the lost have been [Pre-Chorus, rising, emotional restraint] You wash the wound, you bear the cries You learn too young that goodness bleeds and never stays untouched [Chorus, powerful, emotional, soaring] So let my hands get dirty Let my soul burn bright If I must kneel in the filth of this world To help one heart survive the night I was not made for pretty prayers I was made to stay Where the hurt runs deep and the streets don’t care And love still finds a way [Verse 2, stronger, more driven] I’ve stitched the drunks, the thieves, the beaten wives Held together more than flesh and lives I’ve watched the strong go pale with hidden fear And heard the truth in every breath they clear The underworld is not some distant hell It’s every room where no one rings the bell And if you want to drag the dark to heel You need the kind of hands that know how pain can feel [Pre-Chorus, building, fuller instrumentation] No holy choir, no noble grace Just tired eyes and stubborn hearts that will not look away [Chorus, powerful, bigger, emotional] So let my hands get dirty Let my soul burn bright If I must kneel in the filth of this world To help one heart survive the night I was not made for pretty prayers I was made to stay Where the hurt runs deep and the streets don’t care And love still finds a way [Bridge, softer, vulnerable, slowly swelling] And then I found you where I did not look In candle smoke, in vows, in haunted books So strange, so still, so dark, so full of grace A different fire written in your face You are blood and ritual, thorn and sacred art I am thread and bruises, pulse and stubborn heart But opposites, mon amour, still move the same Two different hands reaching through the flame [Breakdown, emotional, almost whispered to rising] I never thought that I would be the one To lose my breath, to come undone Not in a house of ghosts and rose-stained light Not in the arms that make the dark feel right [Final Chorus, massive, passionate, triumphant] So let my hands get dirty Let my soul burn bright If I must kneel in the filth of this world To help one heart survive the night I was not made for pretty prayers I was made to stay Where the hurt runs deep and the streets don’t care And love still finds a way Yes, love still finds a way [Outro, soft, tender, resolved] Dirty hands Open heart That is where all healing starts In the dark In the pain Still we choose each other again