Lyrics

Cameras turned like weather vanes 
Toward another golden son E
very room already loved him 
Before he’d even won
Not with armies 
Not with steel 
But by deciding what is real

The headlines loved the younger face 
The easy smile, the practiced grace I
watched the fracture underneath
 And learned exactly where to place my teeth

I never raised a single knife 
I never took a single life
 I only whispered into life The doubts they feared were true
A tiny shadow in the rain 
A quiet pressure on the brain 
And when they asked who was to blame 
I simply taught them who to love

Desdemona spoke in daylight
 The kind that leaves no place to hide
 But fear has always had a language
 And I could make it sound like pride
A careful pause
 A tilted frame 
A different meaning for the same name

The room was full of certainty
 Until I offered possibility 
A seed is small, a thought is light
 But both can split a world in time

I never raised a single knife
 I never took a single life
 I only whispered into life
The doubts they feared were true
A tiny shadow in the rain 
A quiet pressure on the brain 
And when they asked who was to blame 
I simply taught them who to love

A photograph 
A careless glance 
A harmless moment given circumstance
The story changed with every telling
Until the lie became the fact 
And every hand that held the evidence 
Helped me erase the tracks

Truth stood waiting in the corner 
Patient as a winter tree 
But truth requires a willing witness 
And no one wanted what they’d see

Years later they still tell the story
 As though the ending came from fate 
Not from a thousand smaller choices 
Made a little bit too late
The awful competence of death 
The ease with which we play our part 
Monsters rarely look the part 
Sometimes they simply learn your heart

I never raised a single knife 
I never took a single life 
I only whispered into life 
The doubts they feared were true
A tiny shadow in the rain 
A quiet pressure on the brain 
And when they asked who was to blame 
They found themselves and not my name

I wore white gloves 
So no one saw the dirt
I spoke so softly 
No one heard the hurt
Every mirror knows my face 
Every hallway knows my name 
Every note the violin played 
Was true before I ever made 
A single move