[Intro] [Instrumental — vinyl crackle under the first chord, held through the whole track] [Verse 1] I asked a machine to help me find the words for a song about losing my own words. Funny how much easier it gets to speak, the harder it gets to know which parts are me. [Pre-Chorus] I used to carry numbers in my head, directions, dates, the things my father said. Now something else remembers where I've been - and I can't recall the last time I just... remembered. [Chorus] We traded the muscle for the map, let something else remember the way back. Every question answered before it's asked, and somewhere in the ease, we're losing the callus, not the skill. So hold the thread before it's gone - before the wanting to know becomes just wanting told. [Instrumental Break] [Verse 2] We used to get lost to find our way home, used to sit with a question, alone, let it turn over till it turned into thought - now we ask, and it's answered before it's sought. [Bridge] So play it again till it's ours by hand, not because we can't - because we still stand for the slow way, the hard way, the true, the parts of us no machine can learn for you. [Instrumental Break] [Chorus] We won't trade the muscle for the map, we're taking the long way back. Let the questions sit a while, unanswered - let the not-knowing teach us something real. We are not losing the skill, we're just growing back the callus, one by one. [Outro] [Instrumental — vinyl crackle carries through to the last note]
