Something in me died ( Cobblestone Cut )

By the power of truth, I, while living, have conquered the universe © 2026 Mark Damon Bitkower. Lyrics & written content are original and owned by the author. All rights reserved. No reproduction, redistribution, or use without prior written permission. 🐰🌙𝕵𝖆𝖈𝖐𝕽𝖆𝖇𝖇𝖎𝖙 𝕾𝖑𝖎𝖒𝖘🌙🐰 [Verse 1] They crowned me in gold on the west side stage, called me the finest to ever draw horsehair through rage, black silk, white lights, Lincoln Center snow, half the world rose when I made the high note glow. But I learned something strange in the thunder of praise, a room full of love can still leave you erased. I bowed to the cameras, I smiled on cue, while something inside me stopped needing you. [Pre-Chorus] No scene, no shattered glass, no headline saying I collapsed. Just a hush where the hunger used to live, just a hand that finally closed after all it used to give. [Chorus] Something in me died in a beautiful way, not blood, not fire, just walking away. From the hands that applauded but never could hold, from the warmth I kept performing when my spirit went cold. Now Manhattan can keep every chandelier sky, I’ve played for the gods, I’ve learned how to die to the version of me that needed the room— I’m leaving for Valhalla before I leave too soon. [Verse 2] I was the late-night call, the velvet repair, the one who could hear what nobody said in the air. I tuned other people while detuning my own heart, made a cathedral of patience, let it tear me apart. Years went by in black cars and encore acclaim, but usefulness and love are not the same. I gave until the giving became my chains, and they called it devotion while I swallowed the pain. [Pre-Chorus] Brick by brick, the silence grew, not because I hated them, because I finally knew. Some people love the light but never ask what it costs to burn that bright. [Chorus] Something in me died in a beautiful way, not rage, not revenge, just no longer staying. No more feeding the ache with a standing ovation, no more building my worth on their admiration. Let the critics keep score, let the patrons all sigh, I’ve mastered the art of the last goodbye. To the version of me that lived for the room— I’m leaving for Valhalla before I leave too soon. [Bridge] Up in the hills where the winter breathes slow, past the stone walls and the bare black crows, I’ll open the case with nobody near, play one long note just to prove I am here. Not for a donor, a review, or a name, not to be worshipped, not to be claimed. I will play for the trees and the old gray sky, for the self that survived when the false self died. [Instrumental Violin Solo] [Verse 3] They’ll say I got distant. They’ll say I got strange. No— I just stopped making my soul a stage. I still know beauty. I still know grace. I just don’t offer my pulse to every hungry place. If love comes now, it comes clean and clear, not dressed as dependence, not fed by fear. I have fewer voices, but the ones that remain don’t ask me to vanish to keep them sustained. [Final Chorus] Something in me died and thank God it did, the child who confused being needed with being seen. Now the bow hits the string like an honest prayer, nothing to prove and no one to spare. From Manhattan midnight to Valhalla dawn, I am not fading, I am carrying on. Not cold, not broken, not emptied of light— just whole enough now to walk out of sight. [Outro] So when the papers ask where the maestro has gone, tell them the performance ended, but the soul played on. Tell them the silence wasn’t loss, it was truth made visible. Tell them I did not disappear. I became indivisible.