(Intro - spoken, slightly distorted, like an old recording)
You ask me... you ask me why I turned out like this?
Heh... Shit just happens, I guess...
(Beat drops - hard, gritty, minimalist boom-bap with a haunting piano loop)
Verse 1
Yo... check it...
You askin' why I'm so cold, a ghost in my own skin?
I'll just tell you straight up, "Yo, that's just the state I'm in."
Been a stranger to myself, the man in the mirror's a fraud,
This heart inside my chest? Just a muscle, man, dear God...
It stopped feelin' shit, the nerve endings are all severed,
So don't you ask me dumb questions, a'ight? Just... whatever.
You wanna know if I loved? For real? Like, "ride or die"?
Yeah, I did, but the ride crashed and burned, ain't gonna lie.
I drank an ocean of tears, bitch, 'til my throat was raw,
Now the silence in my soul's the only goddamn law.
There's no static, no white noise, just a flatline hum,
Numb... Dumber than the dumbest motherfucker I've become.
[chorus]
I just want to breathe life.
I just want to breathe.
I just want to breathe life
why can't I breathe tell me?!
[Instrumental Interlude]
Verse 2
You think I got regrets? That I'm sittin' here all sad?
Nah, I just learned my lessons from the fucked-up life I've had.
I'm starin' into the void, this hazy, fucked-up view,
And guess what I see, motherfucker? Me... and you.
Both stranded on our own islands, ain't that a bitch?
You say, "Time heals all wounds!"—Yo, who told you that shit?
Time's a butcher with a dull blade, it don't heal, it maims!
It just teaches you to limp forward while you're screamin' out names
Of the ghosts that haunt your hallways when your path ain't guaranteed,
When your future's a blank check written out to "misery and greed."
Yeah... I slammed the door on that dream, that fairytale I bought,
Left the keys on the table, a deliberate afterthought.
Stopped fallin' for the void, for the promise in the dark,
Stopped gamblin' with my soul, leavin' a permanent mark.
I remember the exact second the power grid was blown,
Every nerve in my body was a live wire, over-grown.
You call me cynical, twisted, a bitter, jaded mess?
Try survivin' when your guardian angel's address is "Address Unknown," I guess!
When "trust" is just a four-letter word spray-painted on a wall,
And your "love story" is a cheap soap opera, cancelled in the fall!
[chorus]
I just want to breathe life.
I just want to breathe.
I just want to breathe life
why can't I breathe tell me?!
[Instrumental Interlude]
Verse 3
You see these scars? Nah, you don't, they're buried underneath,
And every day, the voice inside is grindin' its goddamn teeth.
It's gettin' rougher, a low growl, a beast that's chained and pissed,
I built my castles on solid ground, or so I thought—it was mist.
Now everything I ever cherished is disarmed and stripped bare,
Lyin' in the rubble, gaspin' for the fuckin' air.
They tell me, "Open up, Em, be vulnerable, don't be so tough!"
But every time I did, I got burned alive, ain't that enough?!
So pardon me if my stare is colder than a coroner's slab,
I just torched my own insides so I wouldn't have to go back to that lab
And be some fuckin' experiment for pain again, you see?
I'd rather be this empty shell than a casualty.
(Beat cuts for a moment, then comes back with more intensity)
Outro
So don't ask...
Don't you dare try to open this Pandora's Box, there ain't no answers in it,
Just the echo of my past sins, every last godforsaken minute.
Just the ash from burnt-out letters and the dust from shattered tapes,
And the monster starin' back at you... that's one of my many shapes.
I built him myself from the wreckage, the anger, and the spite,
And this beat? That's his black heart, poundin' through the goddamn night.
(Sound of a deep, shaky breath, then a quiet, bitter laugh that fades out with the beat)
...You ask me why I turned out like this?
[chorus]
I just want to breathe life.
I just want to breathe.
I just want to breathe life
why can't I breathe tell me?!
[Instrumental Interlude]
