SECOND LANGUAGE

You asked me what I meant back then while the room was still too loud Ash was fighting with the monitor Nova trying to sing above it I said maybe drop the snare there Maybe leave that line alone You heard practical suggestions I heard part of myself go by I moved the chord beneath the verse so your voice could land in it Left a bar before the chorus when I saw you start to break I was never being distant I was trying to make a place Some of us speak in sentences Some of us alter the shape I said it in the silence I said it in the change I said it when the bridge arrived and took the weight away Music was my first language Before I knew what words were for I said it in the voicing I said it in the closing door You were waiting for a confession I gave you harmony instead Music was my first language Speech came second in my head There was a night in winter you could hear the pipes expand Lucien pacing near the hallway Lyra tapping out her hands Somebody said he never says much Somebody else said that’s just Kade I nearly laughed because the room was full of things I’d already said Every modulation meant stay here Every dropout meant I know Every low string under a melody meant don’t let this one go I tuned around your differences I wrote beneath your fear People call that arrangement Sometimes it was care I said it in the tension I said it in release I said it when the wrong note turned and sounded like belief Music was my first language Before I knew what words were for I said it in the voicing I said it in the closing door You were waiting for a confession I gave you harmony instead Music was my first language Speech came second in my head I know how this sounds Like an excuse Like I hid behind the arrangement because it was safer than being known Maybe sometimes I did But if I changed the key to keep your voice from tearing that was not avoidance That was love with better equipment So when I answer slowly now it isn’t emptiness or doubt I’m still searching for the version that doesn’t come out as sound I can try to call things by name say what mattered, say what stayed Say I held too much in music because music always stayed And if I missed the human timing if I let the real words wait Then hear them in the lifted ending hear them in the breathing space I was speaking all along You just asked the wrong part of me Music was my first language Before I knew what words could do I said it in the leaving I said it in what carried through You were waiting for a confession I built one in the chords instead Music was my first language Speech came second in my head Music was my first language Now I’m trying to translate If I ever sounded distant I was only rearranging pain