[verse 1] It starts like smoke where the pines got struck One careless match and I’m all lit up I turn paper cuts to county lines Wear hurt like rusted fence wire wrapped tight around my mind. [verse 2] Some days I’m a field in late December Fence posts leaning where the frost won’t surrender You hear my quiet like a screen door slam But I’m just wandering old backroads I don’t understand. [chorus] I don’t know how to name it This flood in the roots, this frost in the basement Somewhere between your arms and my regrets I’m sorry I’m not always the man you met But I’ll learn your hands again. [verse 3] We talk like thunder rolling off the ridge One wrong word and I drift an inch I go somewhere else when I should stay near Like shutting down somehow feels easier than staying here. [verse 4] I’ve built whole distances inside our home Turned passing time into being alone Every look feels like a quiet plea When all you ever wanted was more of me with me. [chorus] I don’t know how to name it This war in the weeds, this blood in the branches I know I’ve broken what I swore I’d protect I’m sorry I’m not always the man you met But I’ll learn your hands again. [verse 5] I’m learning grace like a language gone cold Trying to thaw these hands I taught not to hold God knows you deserved a steadier sea Not someone bailing water from a boat with no belief. [verse 6] But in the quiet, beneath all the noise Past the shattered glass and the static in my voice You’re still the prayer I don’t say enough The home I carry, even when I’m not enough. [chorus] I don’t know how to say it How your love stays when my outline’s fading How you stand where I might’ve quit I’m sorry I’m not always the man you met But I’ll learn your hands again. [bridge] So if I’m a storm, I’ll learn to be rain To fall on your garden, not drown it in pain If I’m a fire, I’ll learn to be light Not something that scorches, but keeps you through night. [final chorus, orchestral choir crescendo] I know I couldn’t frame it All these crooked bones, all this runaway anguish But you stayed when I was counterfeit And I will become again the man you met As I learn your hands again. [outro] So hear me when I tell you Through the black ice dawns and the worn-through blue I’ll be there when the branches bend. You were shelter when mine was borrowed You held the weight of my borrowed tomorrows Now let me learn your hands again. [final line, voice only] I’ll learn your hands again. I’ll learn your hands again.
