Descended

[Intro] (Yeah…) (No more falling…) (I know this place…) (It knows my name…) [Verse 1] I don’t wake up screaming now, the nightmare sleeps in me Breathing like a furnace in the boards beneath my feet The flies know every secret, they orbit where I stand Like black confetti blessing every bloodstain on my hands I quit asking God for help, He stopped returning calls Now the silence in the drywall answers through the walls There’s a rhythm in the basement, like a chain against a pipe And it sounds a little like me on the worst night of my life I been writing names in circles, crossing out the ones I knew Trying to separate the monster from the mirror in the room But the mirror got my posture, and the grin behind my teeth So I cover it with sheets and still it whispers when I sleep [Pre-Chorus] I’m not running now I know the way it goes First the pulse, then the panic Then the cold gets in your bones [Chorus] Now I live below the house Where the dead air hums Where the floor gives out And the black tide comes No light, no mercy, no clean way through Just a mouth in the dark saying, “I made you” I was descending then I’m the depth now If Heaven had a line I crossed it somehow So when you hear that knock Don’t ask who’s around I don’t fall anymore I pull things down [Verse 2] Kitchen light flickers like a witness with a guilty tongue And every room’s a courtroom where the verdict’s already come There’s a freezer in the garage that I never open twice ‘Cause the second time’s the human part that asks me what’s inside My veins don’t beg for needles like they used to in the past Now the sickness comes natural, smooth as shattered glass I can taste metal in the tap water, static in my jaw Like the whole house is chewing on me, slow and raw Neighbors say they smell something, I say plumbing, septic line Smile polite, hold eye contact, keep the dead behind my eyes But the sink won’t drain the crimson and the dogs won’t cross the hall They just whine at something pacing where there’s no one there at all [Verse 3] There’s a girl in my memory with a February face Warm hands, soft voice, salt tears I still can’t place She said, “You can still come back if you leave before it’s late” But I was already married to the hunger and the weight Now her name hits like a siren when the night goes thin and still And for one sharp second I remember how to feel That’s the cruelest kind of haunting—not the bodies, not the gore Just the ghost of who I was leaning harmless at the door Then the pipes begin their singing and the tenderness is gone And the thing I’ve been becoming pulls my shadow further on So I lock the final window, kill the porch light, hold my breath Love can’t live down here with me, it would only starve to death [Bridge] (Whispered) Listen… That sound in the floor? That’s not the house settling… That’s me… Learning how to stay [Breakdown] No halo left No fever left Just teeth and time and a bad address No last good prayer No great reveal Just rot so old it starts to feel real [Chorus] Now I live below the house Where the dead air hums Where the floor gives out And the black tide comes No light, no mercy, no clean way through Just a mouth in the dark saying, “I made you” I was descending then I’m the depth now If Heaven had a line I crossed it somehow So when you hear that knock Don’t ask who’s around I don’t fall anymore I pull things down [Outro] (Below the house…) (Under your feet…) (I quit screaming…) (The walls do it for me…) (No more descending…) (I’m underground…) (If you come looking…) (I’ll keep you down…)