[Verse 1] I used to think a gentle hands Could make a savage understand If I spoke softly, kept my grace The world might meet me halfway So I swallowed every little slight Called it growth, called it being kind Turned every wound into a lesson Till the lesson started bleeding through the lines They teach you empathy like a civic duty But monetize the damage, then romanticize the cruelty Everybody’s traumatized, everybody’s justified Everybody’s the victim with a knife behind their smile I watched compassion become currency Sold to the highest bidder on a screen A thousand hearts beneath a tragedy Then twenty thousand laughing at somebody’s misery Maybe we’re not losing our humanity Maybe we’re just finally seeing How cheap it was to begin with [Pre-Chorus] I tried to be the bigger person Be a grown man But somehow I’m the one who had to shrink I gave them every benefit of doubt They used it as a place to hide their sins [Chorus] I’m not ready to make nice I’m not ready to back down I’m not ready to feel right Still mad as fuck ’cause these people still around Never let me have time Never let me evolve mine All the madness and sadness and despair shit Still striking round and round and bounce around Forgive sounds like a blessing Forget — now you’re twisted They said time will heal everything eventually And I’m here waiting Tired of being too nice then damaged I’m not ready to make nice Not ready to make nice [Verse 2] They love a peaceful man ,Until he finally draws a line Then suddenly his boundaries Are symptoms of a troubled mind “Be mature.” “Let it go.” “Don’t stoop down.” Funny how morality Always gets louder when you’re the one crying out They call it cancel culture When consequences finally knock Call it free speech when they punch down Then cry censorship when somebody talks We built a world where evil shit gets engagement And kindness needs a fucking sponsorship Where outrage is an algorithm And loneliness is a demographic [Pre-Chorus] I tried to be the bigger person Be a grown man But somehow I’m the one who had to shrink I gave them every benefit of doubt They used it as a place to hide their sins [Chorus] I’m not ready to make nice I’m not ready to back down I’m not ready to feel right Still mad as fuck ’cause these people still around Never let me have time Never let me evolve mine All the madness and sadness and despair shit Still striking round and round and bounce around Forgive sounds like a blessing Forget — now you’re twisted They said time will heal everything eventually And I’m here waiting Tired of being too nice then damaged I’m not ready to make nice Not ready to make nice Not ready to make nice [Bridge — spoken / cinematic] Maybe I don’t need to forgive you tonight. Maybe healing isn’t turning the knife into a flower. Maybe it’s learning which doors deserve a key and which ones deserve a wall. They told me “Be the bigger person.” So I became so big I disappeared inside everybody else’s expectations. I mistook self-erasure for compassion. I mistook silence for peace. I mistook being needed for being loved. And somewhere between “understand them” and “don’t judge them” I forgot— I am allowed to judge what happens to me. Not their soul. Not their worth. Their behavior. And that’s the part they never taught us how to say nicely. [Chorus] I’m not ready to make nice I’m not ready to back down I’m not ready to feel right Still mad as fuck ’cause these people still around Never let me have time Never let me evolve mine All the madness and sadness and despair shit Still striking round and round and bounce around Forgive sounds like a blessing Forget — now you’re twisted They said time will heal everything eventually And I’m here waiting Tired of being too nice then damaged I’m not ready to make nice Not ready to make nice [Breakdown - speaking outro] I don’t wanna hate you I just don’t want you near me I don’t wanna curse you I just want you out of my history I don’t need your downfall I don’t need an apology I need the absence of the attack Maybe that’s forgiveness Maybe that’s enough Not shaking your hand Not pretending we were friends Just refusing to let your pathology become my personality in the end
