INHERITED STORM Poetic Contemporary R&B / Neo-Soul [Verse 1] Feels like we're born beneath a borrowed sky, Wearing old sins we never called ours. Running barefoot through the ashes Of a house we never set on fire. We learned to dance around the cracks, Smile with the weight upon our backs. Somebody else's yesterday Keeps knocking on our door today. [Pre-Chorus] Tell me, how do you bury a ghost That never belonged to you? How do you mend a broken road When you didn't break it in two? [Chorus] Maybe we're caught in a crooked system, Where the innocent pay the price. Living in the echoes of a past That keeps asking for our lives. But I won't let another man's shadow Become the shape of my soul. They may have handed me the ashes, But I'll decide what grows. [Verse 2] We've been drinking from a poisoned well, Calling survival a way of life. Learning to call the wounds we're given Just another sacrifice. And every door that should've opened Had somebody else's lock. Still, I kept my hands on the handle, Even when the world said, "Stop." [Pre-Chorus] Maybe we're not cursed— Maybe we're just carrying Stories that were never finished. Maybe the bloodline isn't a sentence, Maybe I'm the page Where the cycle diminishes. [Chorus] Maybe we're caught in a crooked system, Where the innocent pay the price. Living in the echoes of a past That keeps asking for our lives. But I won't let another man's shadow Become the shape of my soul. They may have handed me the ashes, But I'll decide what grows. [Bridge — stripped-down, emotional] I didn't choose the storm, But I learned its language. I didn't choose the scars, But they taught me courage. And if the past Wrote the first few lines, I'll pick up the pen And rewrite mine. No more carrying stones From somebody else's grave. No more calling it destiny When it's only what we were handed. [Final Chorus — powerful] So let the old ghosts Knock until their hands grow tired. I have a new name for this fire— Not a curse, But a light. They may have given me the ashes, They may have buried me in doubt, But I was never meant To disappear beneath it all. I'll grow through the concrete. I'll bloom through the cracks. I'll love without carrying The weight of the past. And if this is where The cycle comes undone— Let it end with me. [Outro — whispered R&B] I am not yesterday. I am not their mistake. I am not the wound They forgot to heal. I'm the one who stayed. I'm the one who rose. I'm the one who finally said— This story ends here. And mine begins now.
