What Wounded Me

[Verse 1]
You left the kettle singing
While the morning gathered steam
I saw the tired in your shoulders
And the part you tried to keep unseen

I had a sharper answer
Folded underneath my tongue
But mercy made a little room
For all the damage we had done

[Pre-Chorus]
A hand can close a door
Or turn the handle slow
A heart can keep the score
Or let the old hurt go

[Chorus]
Love is the work we choose
When nobody can see
A thousand small refusals
To become what wounded me

Hold me when I lose my way
I’ll hold you when you’re wrong
Forgiveness is not forgetting
It’s making room to carry on

[Verse 2]
Your brother called from Denver
With a silence in his voice
He said the world had taught him
To mistake a wall for choice

So we stayed beside the window
Let the afternoon grow dim
No speech could mend the whole thing
But we did not abandon him

[Pre-Chorus]
A name can be a chain
Or something we release
A truth can cut like rain
Or open into peace

[Chorus]
Love is the work we choose
When nobody can see
A thousand small refusals
To become what wounded me

Hold me when I lose my way
I’ll hold you when you’re wrong
Forgiveness is not forgetting
It’s making room to carry on

[Bridge]
If I can hear your fear
Without defending mine
If you can meet my anger
And leave the knife behind

Then every broken promise
Need not become a rule
We can build a better country
From the ways we make things new

[Final Chorus]
Love is the work we choose
In every room and street
A thousand hands together
Can make the future breathe

Hold me when I lose my way
I’ll hold you when you’re wrong
Forgiveness is not forgetting
It’s making room to carry on

[Outro]
Make room, make room
For the stranger and the scar
Make room, make room
That is how we change where we are