[INTRO — spoken, intimate] You disappeared last night. What happened? Nothing happened. Everything happened. I just got lost in something I couldn't stop building. [VERSE 1] Friends started sending stories, then another song, another voice, another message saying, “Can you make something from this?” And I said yeah. Then somebody sent a memory. Somebody sent a text. Somebody handed me a piece of their life and said, “See if you can hear it.” So I listened. Then I wrote. Then I listened again. Different voice. Different beat. Different wound. Different way of saying what nobody says. I think I've heard a hundred hours of music trying to find the right sound for somebody else's truth. And somewhere in the middle of it I disappeared. Not from anybody. Into it. [PRE-CHORUS] That's what I do. When something matters, I don't know how to do half. I give it everything. Sleep gets smaller. The world gets quieter. The work gets louder. Until there's nothing left. [CHORUS] I disappear sometimes. Not because I don't care. Sometimes I disappear because I care too much. I go full force until I hit the wall. Then everything I built starts looking like nothing. Every song sounds wrong. Every word feels cheap. Every reason I had starts slipping underneath me. I disappear. I go dark. Then someday I come back. [VERSE 2] There's a cruel little rhythm to the way I live. Build it. Believe it. Give it everything. Hit the wall. Question everything. Pull away. Tell myself none of it mattered anyway. That's the part nobody sees. The project keeps growing while I get smaller. People say, “You've made something here.” And I nod. I can almost believe them. But there's a room inside me where the applause doesn't reach. A room where I still wonder why anybody listens. Why anybody trusts me with their stories. Why anybody takes me seriously when I can't always take myself seriously. So I keep working. Maybe that's courage. Maybe it's avoidance. Maybe sometimes it's the same thing. [CHORUS] I disappear sometimes. Not because I don't care. Sometimes I disappear because I care too much. I go full force until I hit the wall. Then everything I built starts looking like nothing. Every song sounds wrong. Every word feels cheap. Every reason I had starts slipping underneath me. I disappear. I go dark. Then someday I come back. [BRIDGE — stripped piano] And I'm sorry for the people who are standing outside the door wondering where I went. I'm sorry for the unanswered messages. For the silence. For making people wonder if they did something wrong. They didn't. Sometimes I'm just somewhere I can't explain. Somewhere between “I can do this” and “I can't do anything.” [BEAT RETURNS] But listen— I'm still here. That's the part I forget to count. I'm still here. The songs are still here. The people are still here. The stories are still here. And maybe the work doesn't have to be perfect to be real. Maybe it just has to survive me. [VERSE 3] So if I disappear, don't build a grave around it. Don't turn my silence into a goodbye. I might just be walking through the dark trying to find the door. And if I come back quiet, don't ask me to explain it. Just sit there. Let me remember what daylight feels like. Because I don't always need somebody to pull me out. Sometimes I need somebody who knows I'll eventually walk out myself. [FINAL CHORUS — expansive] I disappear sometimes. Not because I don't care. Sometimes I disappear because I care too much. I give everything until there's nothing left to give. Then I go dark. Then I doubt. Then I breathe. Then I begin again. And maybe that's not failure. Maybe that's the rhythm. Maybe the work isn't proving I can stay at the top forever. Maybe it's learning how to return. [OUTRO — spoken] So yeah. I disappeared last night. I was making something. Something bigger than I expected. Something made out of other people's words, other people's pain, other people's prayers. And somewhere along the way I forgot there was a person behind the songs. I'm trying to remember him. I'll be back.
0/500