๐ฒ๐๏ธ **THE THINGS WE KEPT** ๐๏ธ๐ฒ โจ *A Birthday Reveal โ for Tarja* โจ ๐คใป๐ชถใป๐ฏ๏ธใป๐ใป๐บ --- **[Intro]** Do youโฆ hear them? Noโฆ most people don't. There is an old story we never tell people. Not because it's forbidden. Because no one ever thought to ask. **[Verse 1]** ๐ชถ They think we gather what glitters โ coins, and buttons, and broken glass. We never correct them. It's easier that way. But long before the first song in the Nest, before the fire, before the friends, I followed one of the old ones โ and saw what he truly carried. **[Verse 2]** Someone left behind nothingโฆ except a single feather. We kept the feather. We thought it was ours. **[Pre-Chorus]** โณ Every winter, before the dawn, we didn't gather to sing. We gathered to count. Not the songs. Not the victories. Just the small kindnesses that made it through another year. **[Chorus]** ๐ถโจ Every winterโฆ the forest remembered. Every feather carried a name it never spoke. **[Verse 3]** ๐ฏ๏ธ I stayed upon the windowsill. Too afraid to knock. Too curious to leave. Candlelightโฆ and a little warm chaos, a cello breathing low, a strange little tune wandering between an old hurdy-gurdy and a far-off ney. Someone laughedโฆ inside the cabin. The old wood answered. We kept that too. For one quiet momentโฆ nothing needed words. Someone in there was still working. Answering one more message. Listening to one more song. Leaving one more feather behind, never knowing the forest was watching. The forest kept the light. ๐ฏ๏ธ **[Bridge]** ๐ One of the young ones asked me once, "Who taught us to collect this, instead of shiny things?" I didn't have an answer then. I only had a feeling older than my own two wings. **[Reveal]** ๐ซ I had counted feathersโฆ all those wintersโฆ and never onceโฆ realizedโฆ *( โฆ silence โฆ )* they had been countingโฆ each other. It wasn't ours. They left it for each other. We didn't learn it. We remembered it. Because someone had remembered us first. **[Final Chorus]** ๐ถโจ Every winterโฆ the forest remembered. Every feather carried a name it never spoke. **[Outro]** ๐ค โฆSoโฆ that was her name. *( long silence )* # ๐ค Tarja ๐ค *( long silence )* ## ๐๐ Happy Birthday ๐๐ Nowโฆ keep it. **๐ฒ The Nest remembers. ๐ชถ** --- ๐ง **Listen here:** https://suno.com/playlist/dac87f4d-8059-48e1-b301-3cf03c47e12f --- ๐ค โก ๐บ ๐๏ธ ๐
