**The Crow That Collected Names** [Intro – warm acoustic guitar + distant crow calls] (soft female voice) It comes at night… When the mind is unguarded. [Verse 1] There’s a crow that flies when the world is asleep With a beak full of silence and secrets to keep It lands on the windowsill, quiet as dust And steals the one thing that a person must trust It takes only names, nothing more, nothing less Leaves the body behind in a hollowed-out rest By morning you wake with a hole in your chest And no word left to answer when someone asks “who?” [Pre-Chorus] You still have your face You still have your hands But the name that once held you Has slipped through the sand [Chorus] The crow that collected names Keeps them all in its nest of black thread The crow that collected names Knows every secret you’ve never said You can shout at the sky You can beg and explain But the crow only answers With the sound of your name [Verse 2] Some say it trades them for stars that have died Some say it feeds them to the turning of tide Others believe it is building a throne Made of everything people have claimed as their own The ones who have lost it walk softer somehow They listen more closely, they furrow their brow They feel like a story that’s missing its start A book with no title and pages still dark [Pre-Chorus] You still know the roads You still know the pain But the word that once named you Won’t come back again [Chorus] The crow that collected names Keeps them all in its nest of black thread The crow that collected names Knows every secret you’ve never said You can shout at the sky You can beg and explain But the crow only answers With the sound of your name [Bridge – richer and more emotional] I saw it once In the corner of dusk It looked at me sideways With a hunger like rust It tilted its head As if weighing my worth Then flew toward the place Where the lost names give birth [Final Chorus – fuller, warm and powerful] The crow that collected names Has a kingdom of whispers and wings The crow that collected names Is the keeper of unfinished things If you wake in the night And your tongue feels too light You may already be One of its collected names [Outro – soft acoustic + fading crow calls] (soft) It never forgets… Even when you do.
