Dresses on the Chair

[Verse 1]

Boots by the doorway

Your coat on the rail

Your cup on the table

Lip print

Gone pale

Street full of marching

I iron your sleeve

Counting each button

Teaching my hands to let you leave

[Pre-Chorus]

You say "it’s just for a season"

I hear "it might be forever"

I fold your name into letters

Hide them deep in a drawer

[Chorus]

So take my quiet years

Lay them down like flowers

All my unborn days

I gift them to this hour

If all that I can give

Is this life we might have shared

Then I will stand right here and say

I sacrificed it all

So you’d be spared

[Verse 2]

Dresses on the chair back

Dust on the frame

Your smile in the photo

Still saying my name

Sirens at midnight

Sleep comes in shards

I stitch every headline

Like medals over my heart

[Pre-Chorus]

You wrote "hold on to the morning"

Ink blurred by the rain on the glass

I trace each letter so slowly

As if it could turn back the past

[Chorus]

So take my quiet years

Lay them down like flowers

All my unborn days

I gift them to this hour

If all that I can give

Is this life we might have shared

Then I will stand right here and say

I sacrificed it all

So you’d be spared

[Bridge]

If courage is staying

When all else has gone

Then I am a lantern

Burning alone

If love is a promise

Etched into stone

Then carve me beside you

Though I never leave home (oh)

[Chorus]

So take my quiet years

Lay them down like flowers

All my unborn days

I gift them to this hour

If all that I can give

Is this life we might have shared

Then let the world remember me

In every silent

Empty chair

I sacrificed it all

My love

So you’d be there