(Intro) [Intro — spoken] Some stories don't die when you bury them. They just learn how to live underground. [Guitar moan] [Verse 1] Midnight lay across my window like a black coat on the street. Little boy beneath the covers, heart still soft, still incomplete. Moonlight crawled across the ceiling, shadows dancing on the wall. I closed my eyes against the darkness, never thought the night could call. I was only a child, Lord, just a child beneath the moon. Didn't know the night could change you before the night was through. [Verse 2] Something came into that darkness I had no words to name. My mind couldn't understand it, but something in me changed. I cried into my pillow while the ceiling stared back cold. There are some kinds of sorrow that a child can't ever hold. I prayed that morning would erase it... But morning came— And it stayed. [Chorus] I wasn't ready... No, I wasn't ready. I was only a child. That night came rolling through my doorway like a storm across the sky. I cried when it was over, but my voice had nowhere to go. No name for what had happened, no words for what I didn't know. I had no words then... [Backing vocal] No words then... Lord, I had no words then. [Verse 3] Morning poured its silver through the curtains, birds were singing in the trees. Everybody said the morning came— nobody asked about the night beneath. I carried that unanswered question like a stone inside my shoe. Every road I ever travelled somehow led me back to you. Years rolled on like boxcars southbound, steel wheels singing through the rain. I learned to smile, I learned to hustle, learned to hide the sound of pain. [Instrumental — 8 bars] [Guitar solo — slow bends, answering the vocal melody.] [Bridge] Then one day I found the language, found the words beneath the scars. Words that turned the midnight shadows into something I could name at last. I thought I carried that little boy all those miles alone... But maybe he was carrying me. Maybe every step I took was his small hand pushing me toward home. [Final Chorus — building] I wasn't ready... I was only a child. But the little flame inside me wouldn't let the darkness win. I had no words to tell you, no words to make you see. So I carried all that silence... Till the silence carried me... (Outro)
