[Spoken opening] For the record— I was here before you noticed. I was making before you named it. I was building before you understood what you were looking at. [Verse 1] I drew blue tears along the doorway Before I knew what sorrow meant A little girl with one blue crayon Making proof of where she'd been No gallery and no permission No witness standing in the room Just something hurting, becoming something Where the silence used to bloom [Pre-chorus] I've spent a lifetime turning feeling Into something I could hold If you never learned to read it That doesn't make the story cold [Chorus] For the record, I was here I made beauty out of fear I kept planting in the field Every truth I couldn't yield For the record, let it stand I made worlds with my own hands You don't have to understand I know who I am [Verse 2] I've been poet, I've been maker I've cut cloth and shaped the clay Built the rooms I couldn't live in Made a doorway anyway I have sung into the darkness I have dressed the empty chair I have made a feast for strangers Who were never even there [Pre-chorus 2] And if nobody came looking Still the table had been laid Every ornament remembers Every mark my fingers made [Chorus] For the record, I was here I made beauty out of fear I kept planting in the field Every truth I couldn't yield For the record, let it stand I made worlds with my own hands You don't have to understand I know who I am [Bridge] You refusing to see me doesn't make me disappear. You refusing to love me doesn't make me less sincere. You refusing to name it doesn't change what I became. I don't need your recognition to remember my own name. [Chorus] I live by love. I look for truth. I make beauty where I can. And whether anybody witnesses it— I remain. [Final chorus] For the record, I remain Through the harvest, through the rain Every season left a trace Every wound became a place For the record, I am free I don't live for you to see I can leave these words right here And go make something beautiful [Outro] I was here. I noticed. I questioned. I made something. For the record.
