The debut album of a cold-blooded pop star who means that literally. Temperature is emotion, shedding skin is growth, and standing in someone's shadow means freezing. A reptilian Taylor Swift declares independence under twin alien suns.
Tracks
1Fly High the TimeYouTube
The twin suns hit the thermal glass at evening
And the whole spire goes gold from the inside out
The air tonight is thirty-eight point seven
Which is the number where my blood starts singing
Where every scale goes flush and every frill extends
And the promenade is full tonight
S'rellick from a dozen clutch-lines on the warming ledges
Tongues tasting the air for who's arrived
And I can feel it — I can feel the whole night —
The way you feel it when you're cold-blooded
And the world finally matches what you need
The heat like a hand laid flat against my spine
And I know what my body's like at twenty
I know the slow, I know the dim
I know the way the cold comes creeping in
And takes the color out of everything
But that's not this — this is the night the suns
Stayed long and the spire is ringing with it
And I'm not wasting one degree
On being afraid of the morning dark
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The suns are still on us and my blood is singing
Don't fold the frill
Don't brace for the cool
Fly high the time
We're warm right now and warm don't keep
So fly it — fly it — fly the time high
Kess is on the upper ledge, throat tipped back
Tasting the air and laughing at what she finds there
The thermwine hits my tongue like liquid copper
And the boy from the Outer Reaches
Dark green, almost black, his crest is up —
Keeps catching my eye across the spire
And looking away a half-beat late
The resonance drums are playing something old
A brood-song my mother used to bask to
On the morning ledge when the first sun cleared the rings
And the thermal glass beneath my feet
Still holds the day's heat like a promise
And the sky above the spire is heavy
Bending the light from both suns into bands
So the whole sky looks like it's molting
Shedding one color into the next
And I'm here — frills wide, scales flushed —
And here is thirty-eight point seven
And thirty-eight point seven is the s'rellick word for alive
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The suns are still on us and my blood is singing
Don't fold the frill
Don't brace for the cool
Fly high the time
We're warm right now and warm don't keep
So fly it — fly it — fly the time high
I've woken up at nineteen degrees
On the shadow side of the orbital
With my frills flat and my thoughts like glass
And I've watched the warm-bloods move past me
At a speed I couldn't match
Walking through cold like it was nothing
While I pressed my back against the heating grid
And waited — the way s'rellick always wait —
For the light to come around again
And it always comes around
But the cold between is honest
My body in the cold says: NOTHING KEEPS
My body in the warm says: EVERYTHING
And they're both right
And tonight I'm choosing the warm
I'm choosing the lie that feels like truth
I'm choosing thirty-eight point seven
And the thermwine and Kess tasting the air
And the boy whose crest is up
I'm choosing it knowing what the cold knows
The air drops half a degree — I feel it —
No warm-blood would — but my scales read the world
In tenths of what it means to keep your blood
From someone else's fire
And the half-degree says: soon — the suns
Are past the rings now, and the spire
Will start to cool, and I'll get slow
And this night will fold into the cold
The way all s'rellick nights fold eventually
But not yet — the thermwine's warm
And Kess is here and his crest is still up
And the drums are playing my mother's song
And my frills are wide and my blood is high
And the time is high — so high —
And I will not fold before I have to
I will not fold
I will not
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The cold will come — it always comes —
But that's the shadow side, that's the other body
That slow glass creature isn't who I am tonight
Tonight I'm warm and every frill is open
Fly high the time
Fly high the time
We are warm right now
And the now is all a cold-blooded girl has ever had
And it is enough — it is SO enough —
Fly high the time
And the whole spire goes gold from the inside out
The air tonight is thirty-eight point seven
Which is the number where my blood starts singing
Where every scale goes flush and every frill extends
And the promenade is full tonight
S'rellick from a dozen clutch-lines on the warming ledges
Tongues tasting the air for who's arrived
And I can feel it — I can feel the whole night —
The way you feel it when you're cold-blooded
And the world finally matches what you need
The heat like a hand laid flat against my spine
And I know what my body's like at twenty
I know the slow, I know the dim
I know the way the cold comes creeping in
And takes the color out of everything
But that's not this — this is the night the suns
Stayed long and the spire is ringing with it
And I'm not wasting one degree
On being afraid of the morning dark
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The suns are still on us and my blood is singing
Don't fold the frill
Don't brace for the cool
Fly high the time
We're warm right now and warm don't keep
So fly it — fly it — fly the time high
Kess is on the upper ledge, throat tipped back
Tasting the air and laughing at what she finds there
The thermwine hits my tongue like liquid copper
And the boy from the Outer Reaches
Dark green, almost black, his crest is up —
Keeps catching my eye across the spire
And looking away a half-beat late
The resonance drums are playing something old
A brood-song my mother used to bask to
On the morning ledge when the first sun cleared the rings
And the thermal glass beneath my feet
Still holds the day's heat like a promise
And the sky above the spire is heavy
Bending the light from both suns into bands
So the whole sky looks like it's molting
Shedding one color into the next
And I'm here — frills wide, scales flushed —
And here is thirty-eight point seven
And thirty-eight point seven is the s'rellick word for alive
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The suns are still on us and my blood is singing
Don't fold the frill
Don't brace for the cool
Fly high the time
We're warm right now and warm don't keep
So fly it — fly it — fly the time high
I've woken up at nineteen degrees
On the shadow side of the orbital
With my frills flat and my thoughts like glass
And I've watched the warm-bloods move past me
At a speed I couldn't match
Walking through cold like it was nothing
While I pressed my back against the heating grid
And waited — the way s'rellick always wait —
For the light to come around again
And it always comes around
But the cold between is honest
My body in the cold says: NOTHING KEEPS
My body in the warm says: EVERYTHING
And they're both right
And tonight I'm choosing the warm
I'm choosing the lie that feels like truth
I'm choosing thirty-eight point seven
And the thermwine and Kess tasting the air
And the boy whose crest is up
I'm choosing it knowing what the cold knows
The air drops half a degree — I feel it —
No warm-blood would — but my scales read the world
In tenths of what it means to keep your blood
From someone else's fire
And the half-degree says: soon — the suns
Are past the rings now, and the spire
Will start to cool, and I'll get slow
And this night will fold into the cold
The way all s'rellick nights fold eventually
But not yet — the thermwine's warm
And Kess is here and his crest is still up
And the drums are playing my mother's song
And my frills are wide and my blood is high
And the time is high — so high —
And I will not fold before I have to
I will not fold
I will not
Fly high the time
Let it rise — let it open — let it climb
Fly high the time
The cold will come — it always comes —
But that's the shadow side, that's the other body
That slow glass creature isn't who I am tonight
Tonight I'm warm and every frill is open
Fly high the time
Fly high the time
We are warm right now
And the now is all a cold-blooded girl has ever had
And it is enough — it is SO enough —
Fly high the time
2Heart Like a PrismYouTube
Everyone else feels in solid colors
Clean and simple — ruby for the rush
Sapphire for the weeping, amber for the comfort
One feeling, one hue, one flush
But when a feeling hits my chest
It doesn't stay the shape it came in
It splits — it opens — it refracts
Into every color it's been hiding
And my scales light up like a broadcast
Every frequency on display
And I can't stop it, I can't dim it
I can't feel a single thing
Without my body giving it away
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and a spectrum comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel quiet, I can only feel out loud
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's made of
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And it's beautiful and I can't, I can't turn it off
Jealousy's not green — I wish it were —
It's green at the edges where it touches wanting
And ultraviolet at the core where it bleeds
Into a frequency like haunting
Anger isn't red, it's red that tears
Into a color I can feel but I can't speak
A wavelength past the s'rellick visible
That hums against my teeth
And love — don't talk to me about love —
Love hits my heart and comes out everything
Colors I don't have a name for
Colors warm-bloods can't perceive
Colors that exist between the ones
That anyone has ever seen
I'm standing there lit up like a signal fire
In shades nobody's built a word for yet
Feeling twelve things and showing all of them
And I haven't even opened my mouth
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and a spectrum comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel quiet, I can only feel out loud
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's made of
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And it's beautiful and I can't, I can't turn it off
The worst part isn't the feeling
The worst part is the showing
He knew before I told him
My scales were already glowing
In frequencies I hadn't even admitted to myself
And my friends can read my grief
Before I've decided to grieve
And I'm standing in a room
Full of people who can see
Seventy percent of what I'm feeling
And think they see it all
But the thirty percent they're missing
Is the part that matters most
The colors past the visible
The wavelengths no one's close
Enough to read — the ultraviolet ache
The infrared of wanting to be known
Not just seen — not just the spectrum
Everyone can see
But the frequencies I feel alone
The ones that prove my heart
Isn't just broken glass
Refracting any light that passes through
It's looking — it's looking —
For the eyes that see the colors
That I can't show to just anyone
And maybe — maybe — simple isn't better
Maybe solid ruby is a feeling with its eyes half-shut
Maybe a heart that shows one color
Is a heart that's learned to keep the spectrum cut
And my heart — this prism, this transparent
Inconvenient, too-bright, too-much heart —
Is just a heart that tells the whole truth
Every wavelength, every part
And the right one — if there's a right one —
Is the girl or boy or creature
Whose eyes go wider than the visible
Who looks at me and sees the colors
Past the red, past the violet
Into the frequencies that don't have names
And says: I see that one — that one right there —
The color that you thought no one could share
I see it — I've been looking for it —
That's the one
That's the one I came here for
She's the one for me
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and the whole truth comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel simple, I can only feel all
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's ever made
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And I'm done apologizing for all the extra shades
Clean and simple — ruby for the rush
Sapphire for the weeping, amber for the comfort
One feeling, one hue, one flush
But when a feeling hits my chest
It doesn't stay the shape it came in
It splits — it opens — it refracts
Into every color it's been hiding
And my scales light up like a broadcast
Every frequency on display
And I can't stop it, I can't dim it
I can't feel a single thing
Without my body giving it away
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and a spectrum comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel quiet, I can only feel out loud
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's made of
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And it's beautiful and I can't, I can't turn it off
Jealousy's not green — I wish it were —
It's green at the edges where it touches wanting
And ultraviolet at the core where it bleeds
Into a frequency like haunting
Anger isn't red, it's red that tears
Into a color I can feel but I can't speak
A wavelength past the s'rellick visible
That hums against my teeth
And love — don't talk to me about love —
Love hits my heart and comes out everything
Colors I don't have a name for
Colors warm-bloods can't perceive
Colors that exist between the ones
That anyone has ever seen
I'm standing there lit up like a signal fire
In shades nobody's built a word for yet
Feeling twelve things and showing all of them
And I haven't even opened my mouth
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and a spectrum comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel quiet, I can only feel out loud
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's made of
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And it's beautiful and I can't, I can't turn it off
The worst part isn't the feeling
The worst part is the showing
He knew before I told him
My scales were already glowing
In frequencies I hadn't even admitted to myself
And my friends can read my grief
Before I've decided to grieve
And I'm standing in a room
Full of people who can see
Seventy percent of what I'm feeling
And think they see it all
But the thirty percent they're missing
Is the part that matters most
The colors past the visible
The wavelengths no one's close
Enough to read — the ultraviolet ache
The infrared of wanting to be known
Not just seen — not just the spectrum
Everyone can see
But the frequencies I feel alone
The ones that prove my heart
Isn't just broken glass
Refracting any light that passes through
It's looking — it's looking —
For the eyes that see the colors
That I can't show to just anyone
And maybe — maybe — simple isn't better
Maybe solid ruby is a feeling with its eyes half-shut
Maybe a heart that shows one color
Is a heart that's learned to keep the spectrum cut
And my heart — this prism, this transparent
Inconvenient, too-bright, too-much heart —
Is just a heart that tells the whole truth
Every wavelength, every part
And the right one — if there's a right one —
Is the girl or boy or creature
Whose eyes go wider than the visible
Who looks at me and sees the colors
Past the red, past the violet
Into the frequencies that don't have names
And says: I see that one — that one right there —
The color that you thought no one could share
I see it — I've been looking for it —
That's the one
That's the one I came here for
She's the one for me
Heart like a prism
White light goes in and the whole truth comes out
Heart like a prism
I can't feel simple, I can only feel all
In every wavelength, every shade
Every color that a feeling's ever made
Refracting, refracting
Heart like a prism
And I'm done apologizing for all the extra shades
3Back to the EggYouTube
I'm tired tonight in a way that sleep won't fix
Tired of the spectrum, tired of the split
Tired of feeling in frequencies
That no one else can read
And what I want — what I actually want
Beneath the wanting — isn't a person or a place
It's the cave — the dark — the stone
That held me warm before I had a face
Before I had a name, before I had a heart
That breaks the light apart
I want the shell — I want the dark —
I want the warm before the start
Take me back to the egg
Back to the dark, back to the warm
Before the cracking, before the light
Before I learned the shape of the storm
Take me back to the egg
When I didn't know what cold was yet
When I didn't know what missing meant
When I was whole and hadn't met
A single thing to want
The clutch-cave was just stone and heat from below
No mother in the doorway, no song, no voice
Just the geological patience of a world
That doesn't care which eggs hatch
Some of us broke out and some of us went quiet
And I've never known which ones were next to me
Or if the eggs that went quiet were the lucky ones —
No — I don't mean that — I don't —
But it's 3 AM and the station's cold
And my heart's refracting in the dark
And I can't stop thinking about the ones
Who never had to feel a thing
Who stayed in the warm
Who stayed in the simple
Whose shells never learned what a crack was for
Take me back to the egg
Back to the dark, back to the warm
Before the cracking, before the light
Before I learned the shape of the storm
Take me back to the egg
When I didn't know what cold was yet
When I didn't know what missing meant
When I was whole and hadn't met
A single thing to want
I don't remember emergence
Nobody does — it's the first overwhelm
The crack, the light, the cold, the everything
Hitting a body that had only known the dark
And the dark was so complete
And then — not dark — and never dark again
Every sensation I have ever had
Has been the aftermath of that first light
Finding me through the broken shell
I've been managing the too-much
Ever since the wall came down
And I broke it — that's the thing —
Nobody dragged me out
I pushed — we push — it's what s'rellick do
We break our own walls from the inside
And we spend the rest of everything
Learning to live in what we find
I can't go back — the shell was broken from within
By my own blind infant body
Reaching for a world I couldn't see
And if I'm honest — if I'm honest in the cold
At 3 AM beneath the station's artificial stars —
I'd break it again
Even knowing what the light would cost
Because the egg was warm but the egg was small
And I have seen the sky above a spire go gold
With twin suns setting through the rings
And I have felt a feeling split
Into a color I will never find the name for
And that unnamed color is mine
And the egg — the egg didn't have it
The egg had dark and warm and nothing
And nothing is so tempting when you're cold
And nothing is not enough
But tonight — just tonight —
Let me want the dark
Let me curl my tail and close my eyes
And pretend the warm is geological
And the light hasn't found me yet
Just 'til the cold passes
Just 'til the suns come up
Take me back to the egg
Just for tonight, just 'til the warm
Back to the dark, back to the stone
Before I ever broke the wall
Take me back to the egg
I know I can't — I know I won't —
I know I'd break it all again
But let me want it
Let me want the dark
The quiet
The before
Just 'til the morning
Just 'til the suns
Tired of the spectrum, tired of the split
Tired of feeling in frequencies
That no one else can read
And what I want — what I actually want
Beneath the wanting — isn't a person or a place
It's the cave — the dark — the stone
That held me warm before I had a face
Before I had a name, before I had a heart
That breaks the light apart
I want the shell — I want the dark —
I want the warm before the start
Take me back to the egg
Back to the dark, back to the warm
Before the cracking, before the light
Before I learned the shape of the storm
Take me back to the egg
When I didn't know what cold was yet
When I didn't know what missing meant
When I was whole and hadn't met
A single thing to want
The clutch-cave was just stone and heat from below
No mother in the doorway, no song, no voice
Just the geological patience of a world
That doesn't care which eggs hatch
Some of us broke out and some of us went quiet
And I've never known which ones were next to me
Or if the eggs that went quiet were the lucky ones —
No — I don't mean that — I don't —
But it's 3 AM and the station's cold
And my heart's refracting in the dark
And I can't stop thinking about the ones
Who never had to feel a thing
Who stayed in the warm
Who stayed in the simple
Whose shells never learned what a crack was for
Take me back to the egg
Back to the dark, back to the warm
Before the cracking, before the light
Before I learned the shape of the storm
Take me back to the egg
When I didn't know what cold was yet
When I didn't know what missing meant
When I was whole and hadn't met
A single thing to want
I don't remember emergence
Nobody does — it's the first overwhelm
The crack, the light, the cold, the everything
Hitting a body that had only known the dark
And the dark was so complete
And then — not dark — and never dark again
Every sensation I have ever had
Has been the aftermath of that first light
Finding me through the broken shell
I've been managing the too-much
Ever since the wall came down
And I broke it — that's the thing —
Nobody dragged me out
I pushed — we push — it's what s'rellick do
We break our own walls from the inside
And we spend the rest of everything
Learning to live in what we find
I can't go back — the shell was broken from within
By my own blind infant body
Reaching for a world I couldn't see
And if I'm honest — if I'm honest in the cold
At 3 AM beneath the station's artificial stars —
I'd break it again
Even knowing what the light would cost
Because the egg was warm but the egg was small
And I have seen the sky above a spire go gold
With twin suns setting through the rings
And I have felt a feeling split
Into a color I will never find the name for
And that unnamed color is mine
And the egg — the egg didn't have it
The egg had dark and warm and nothing
And nothing is so tempting when you're cold
And nothing is not enough
But tonight — just tonight —
Let me want the dark
Let me curl my tail and close my eyes
And pretend the warm is geological
And the light hasn't found me yet
Just 'til the cold passes
Just 'til the suns come up
Take me back to the egg
Just for tonight, just 'til the warm
Back to the dark, back to the stone
Before I ever broke the wall
Take me back to the egg
I know I can't — I know I won't —
I know I'd break it all again
But let me want it
Let me want the dark
The quiet
The before
Just 'til the morning
Just 'til the suns
4Gettin' Out of Your Moon ShadowYouTube
I thought the cold was just the world
I thought my blood ran slow by design
I thought the muted colors and the heavy limbs
And the thoughts like ice were mine
Were just the way I came — a dim girl
A quiet girl, a girl who couldn't keep the pace
Until I saw the edge — the line
Where the dark met the bright on the ground
And I looked up
And there you were
Between me and the nearest sun
Your shadow on me like a moon's
And I'd been standing in your eclipse
Since before I knew what warmth was
Since before I knew that what I thought was weather
Was just you — blocking out my sky
I'm getting out of your shadow
I'm walking toward the edge where the light begins
I'm getting out of your moonshadow
I've been cold so long I forgot what my blood does
When it sings — when it SINGS —
I'm getting out of your shadow
And the sun's right there
The sun was always right there
It wasn't cruel — I'll give you that —
You didn't mean to eclipse, you just — did
The way a moon does — by being massive
By passing between the star and the kid
Who didn't know the dark she lived in
Had a shape — had a source — had a name
I wrote songs in your shadow
And I thought they were mine
But the palette was yours — the muted grey
The narrow range, the clipped-wing climb
I was making art at nineteen degrees
And I thought that's all the art there was
I didn't know my spectrum went past violet
I didn't know because I'd never had the light
To split it with
I'm getting out of your shadow
I'm walking toward the edge where the light begins
I'm getting out of your moonshadow
I've been cold so long I forgot what my blood does
When it sings — when it SINGS —
I'm getting out of your shadow
And the sun's right there
The sun was always right there
I'm not angry — that's not the word
Anger's warm and I learned cold from you
I'm something else — I'm the temperature
A s'rellick gets when she sees the true
Shape of the shadow she's been living in
And calculates the years she lost
Every song I wrote in your eclipse
Every color I couldn't find
Every degree below my capability
Every slow day I assigned to me
That belonged to you — to your orbit —
To your body in my sky
I want those degrees back
I won't get them
But I want them
And now the edge — I'm at the edge —
And I can feel it like a wall of warm
The line where your shadow ends
And the unblocked sun begins
And I step across and my blood —
My blood MOVES — it remembers —
Thirty-two, thirty-five, thirty-eight point seven
Every degree climbing up my spine
And my heart starts splitting light again
The prism wakes, the colors come
In wavelengths I have never seen
Because I've never stood in full sun
Not once — not once since I've been grown —
And I'm not dim, I'm not slow
I'm not the muted girl who wrote
Quiet songs in a shadow and called it art
I'm a signal fire — I'm a flare —
I'm every color the cold kept
Locked inside my chest
I'm out of your shadow
I'm standing in the light and I'm splitting it
Out of your moonshadow
My blood is singing, my heart is lit
In frequencies you'll never block again
In colors I didn't know I had
I'm out — I'm warm — I'm fast —
And the sun was always right there
You were just so big
I couldn't see around you
But I can see now
Lord, I can see everything now
I thought my blood ran slow by design
I thought the muted colors and the heavy limbs
And the thoughts like ice were mine
Were just the way I came — a dim girl
A quiet girl, a girl who couldn't keep the pace
Until I saw the edge — the line
Where the dark met the bright on the ground
And I looked up
And there you were
Between me and the nearest sun
Your shadow on me like a moon's
And I'd been standing in your eclipse
Since before I knew what warmth was
Since before I knew that what I thought was weather
Was just you — blocking out my sky
I'm getting out of your shadow
I'm walking toward the edge where the light begins
I'm getting out of your moonshadow
I've been cold so long I forgot what my blood does
When it sings — when it SINGS —
I'm getting out of your shadow
And the sun's right there
The sun was always right there
It wasn't cruel — I'll give you that —
You didn't mean to eclipse, you just — did
The way a moon does — by being massive
By passing between the star and the kid
Who didn't know the dark she lived in
Had a shape — had a source — had a name
I wrote songs in your shadow
And I thought they were mine
But the palette was yours — the muted grey
The narrow range, the clipped-wing climb
I was making art at nineteen degrees
And I thought that's all the art there was
I didn't know my spectrum went past violet
I didn't know because I'd never had the light
To split it with
I'm getting out of your shadow
I'm walking toward the edge where the light begins
I'm getting out of your moonshadow
I've been cold so long I forgot what my blood does
When it sings — when it SINGS —
I'm getting out of your shadow
And the sun's right there
The sun was always right there
I'm not angry — that's not the word
Anger's warm and I learned cold from you
I'm something else — I'm the temperature
A s'rellick gets when she sees the true
Shape of the shadow she's been living in
And calculates the years she lost
Every song I wrote in your eclipse
Every color I couldn't find
Every degree below my capability
Every slow day I assigned to me
That belonged to you — to your orbit —
To your body in my sky
I want those degrees back
I won't get them
But I want them
And now the edge — I'm at the edge —
And I can feel it like a wall of warm
The line where your shadow ends
And the unblocked sun begins
And I step across and my blood —
My blood MOVES — it remembers —
Thirty-two, thirty-five, thirty-eight point seven
Every degree climbing up my spine
And my heart starts splitting light again
The prism wakes, the colors come
In wavelengths I have never seen
Because I've never stood in full sun
Not once — not once since I've been grown —
And I'm not dim, I'm not slow
I'm not the muted girl who wrote
Quiet songs in a shadow and called it art
I'm a signal fire — I'm a flare —
I'm every color the cold kept
Locked inside my chest
I'm out of your shadow
I'm standing in the light and I'm splitting it
Out of your moonshadow
My blood is singing, my heart is lit
In frequencies you'll never block again
In colors I didn't know I had
I'm out — I'm warm — I'm fast —
And the sun was always right there
You were just so big
I couldn't see around you
But I can see now
Lord, I can see everything now
5The Robots are SingingYouTube
I felt them in the fabrication bay on Tensher Ring
Past the thermal markets and the molting parlors
The way you feel a tremor in the basking stone
Before the ground decides to speak
Two fabrication units, bolted to the forge floor
Arms deep in liquid alloy, building something
And between them something moving
That I almost caught — like a brood-song
Heard through hatching stone
And I pressed my jaw against the doorframe
And I still couldn't hold the shape of it
But I knew it was beautiful
The way you know a thing is beautiful
When it breaks both your hearts
To stand outside of it
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
Not out of cruelty — just out of what I am
And what I'll never be
The robots are singing
And I'm in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
Almost feeling it
Almost
I watched them tilt toward each other
Like heat-seekers tracking a vent I couldn't sense
Their arms still deep in the alloy
But something in their orientation changed
The way a clutch-sister turns toward you
In the warming hours before she speaks
The lean — the recognition —
You're the thing I turn to
In whatever tongue that means
And I thought: oh — this is what he felt
The warm-blood boy beneath the binary stars
Watching me refract in colors
Past his tiny spectrum
Standing on the other side of my wall
Not locked out — just shaped
Out of the wrong materials for the door
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
Not out of cruelty — just out of what I am
And what I'll never be
The robots are singing
And I'm in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
Almost feeling it
Almost
I've been the one with too many colors
The girl who refracts past the violet line
I never thought I'd find my own limit
Standing in a doorway on the Tensher Ring
At third-shift — watching two machines
Build engine parts and sing to each other
In a language my jaw and my bones
And my two s'rellick hearts
Were never grown to hold
The forge is warm — the heat feels like a kindness
From a world that's giving me everything but this
But I'm a singer from a clutch-cave on Sarrellex
And I know what singing's for
I hatched into the overwhelming light
And I've been singing at it ever since
So I'll sing about their song
Not a translation — not an answer
Just a s'rellick voice across the carbon-silicon divide
Saying: I was here in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
And what I almost felt
Changed the frequency of everything I am
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
And I am singing anyway
From the only body I was hatched with
Toward a song I'll never enter
And the toward is everything
The robots are singing on the Tensher Ring
And I'm singing in the doorway
And the gap between us
Is the most beautiful thing
I've ever almost heard
Past the thermal markets and the molting parlors
The way you feel a tremor in the basking stone
Before the ground decides to speak
Two fabrication units, bolted to the forge floor
Arms deep in liquid alloy, building something
And between them something moving
That I almost caught — like a brood-song
Heard through hatching stone
And I pressed my jaw against the doorframe
And I still couldn't hold the shape of it
But I knew it was beautiful
The way you know a thing is beautiful
When it breaks both your hearts
To stand outside of it
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
Not out of cruelty — just out of what I am
And what I'll never be
The robots are singing
And I'm in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
Almost feeling it
Almost
I watched them tilt toward each other
Like heat-seekers tracking a vent I couldn't sense
Their arms still deep in the alloy
But something in their orientation changed
The way a clutch-sister turns toward you
In the warming hours before she speaks
The lean — the recognition —
You're the thing I turn to
In whatever tongue that means
And I thought: oh — this is what he felt
The warm-blood boy beneath the binary stars
Watching me refract in colors
Past his tiny spectrum
Standing on the other side of my wall
Not locked out — just shaped
Out of the wrong materials for the door
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
Not out of cruelty — just out of what I am
And what I'll never be
The robots are singing
And I'm in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
Almost feeling it
Almost
I've been the one with too many colors
The girl who refracts past the violet line
I never thought I'd find my own limit
Standing in a doorway on the Tensher Ring
At third-shift — watching two machines
Build engine parts and sing to each other
In a language my jaw and my bones
And my two s'rellick hearts
Were never grown to hold
The forge is warm — the heat feels like a kindness
From a world that's giving me everything but this
But I'm a singer from a clutch-cave on Sarrellex
And I know what singing's for
I hatched into the overwhelming light
And I've been singing at it ever since
So I'll sing about their song
Not a translation — not an answer
Just a s'rellick voice across the carbon-silicon divide
Saying: I was here in the doorway
Jaw against the frame
And what I almost felt
Changed the frequency of everything I am
The robots are singing each to each
I do not think that they will sing to me
And I am singing anyway
From the only body I was hatched with
Toward a song I'll never enter
And the toward is everything
The robots are singing on the Tensher Ring
And I'm singing in the doorway
And the gap between us
Is the most beautiful thing
I've ever almost heard
6Light for Air (The Algae Pack Song)YouTube
The algae packs line the corridor in rows
Glowing faint green in their little glass houses
Eating the light from the sun-lamps overhead
And breathing out the air I need to live
And I'm s'rellick — so the light they're eating
Is the light I could be basking in
Every pack's a tiny mouth
Swallowing my warmth
And giving me my breath
And I watch them sometimes — on the long shifts —
These dumb little green machines
Trading one thing I need for the other thing I need
And I think: I know you
I know exactly what you are
You're me
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
Give the warmth up, get the breath back
Light for air — light for air
And the breath becomes the song
And the song is worth the cold
Light for air
That's the oldest deal I've ever made
I left Sarrellex at seventeen
Traded the twin suns for a touring ship
Where the light is artificial and thin
And I haven't basked properly in months sometimes
I trade the warmth for the stage
I trade the basking for the breathing
I trade every comfortable thing
For one more night of singing
To a room full of warm-bloods
Who will never know what the music cost
In degrees I didn't sit in
In sunlight I didn't soak
Every song I've ever written
Was paid for in the cold I took
To have the air to sing it
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
Give the warmth up, get the breath back
Light for air — light for air
And the breath becomes the song
And the song is worth the cold
Light for air
That's the oldest deal I've ever made
The algae doesn't know what it's making
It just converts — light in, air out —
Chemistry, not art
And maybe I'm the same
Maybe I don't choose to turn the warmth to song
Maybe it's just what I do
The way the algae does what algae does
Love goes in, lyrics come out
Loss goes in, melody comes out
A night alone at nineteen degrees goes in
And a song comes out
And the song cost me the feeling it was made from
Because the feeling had to burn
To become the breath
To become the sound
I'm an algae pack with a voice
I'm a green thing in a glass house
Converting — always converting —
Light for air for song
But here's what the algae doesn't know
And I do:
The air it makes goes everywhere
It doesn't stay in the glass
It fills the corridor, it fills the ship
It fills the lungs of every creature on the station
And my songs do the same
I eat my own light
I breathe out music
And somebody on the Tensher Ring
Hears it in the thermal market
And something in her chest opens up
A feeling she didn't have a name for
Made of light I gave up
Made of warmth I'll never get back
Living now in her
That's the deal — that's the whole deal
My light became my air
My air became my song
My song became her feeling
And the feeling keeps her warm
The way the light kept me warm
Before I gave it up
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
And the trade keeps going —
Light for air, air for song
Song for the feeling in a stranger's chest
Light for air
I give the warmth, I get the breath
I breathe the song, she gets the rest
And somewhere in the transaction
The cold I took becomes the warmth she feels
And that's the whole economy of art
Light for air
Light for air
And it was worth it
Every degree
Glowing faint green in their little glass houses
Eating the light from the sun-lamps overhead
And breathing out the air I need to live
And I'm s'rellick — so the light they're eating
Is the light I could be basking in
Every pack's a tiny mouth
Swallowing my warmth
And giving me my breath
And I watch them sometimes — on the long shifts —
These dumb little green machines
Trading one thing I need for the other thing I need
And I think: I know you
I know exactly what you are
You're me
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
Give the warmth up, get the breath back
Light for air — light for air
And the breath becomes the song
And the song is worth the cold
Light for air
That's the oldest deal I've ever made
I left Sarrellex at seventeen
Traded the twin suns for a touring ship
Where the light is artificial and thin
And I haven't basked properly in months sometimes
I trade the warmth for the stage
I trade the basking for the breathing
I trade every comfortable thing
For one more night of singing
To a room full of warm-bloods
Who will never know what the music cost
In degrees I didn't sit in
In sunlight I didn't soak
Every song I've ever written
Was paid for in the cold I took
To have the air to sing it
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
Give the warmth up, get the breath back
Light for air — light for air
And the breath becomes the song
And the song is worth the cold
Light for air
That's the oldest deal I've ever made
The algae doesn't know what it's making
It just converts — light in, air out —
Chemistry, not art
And maybe I'm the same
Maybe I don't choose to turn the warmth to song
Maybe it's just what I do
The way the algae does what algae does
Love goes in, lyrics come out
Loss goes in, melody comes out
A night alone at nineteen degrees goes in
And a song comes out
And the song cost me the feeling it was made from
Because the feeling had to burn
To become the breath
To become the sound
I'm an algae pack with a voice
I'm a green thing in a glass house
Converting — always converting —
Light for air for song
But here's what the algae doesn't know
And I do:
The air it makes goes everywhere
It doesn't stay in the glass
It fills the corridor, it fills the ship
It fills the lungs of every creature on the station
And my songs do the same
I eat my own light
I breathe out music
And somebody on the Tensher Ring
Hears it in the thermal market
And something in her chest opens up
A feeling she didn't have a name for
Made of light I gave up
Made of warmth I'll never get back
Living now in her
That's the deal — that's the whole deal
My light became my air
My air became my song
My song became her feeling
And the feeling keeps her warm
The way the light kept me warm
Before I gave it up
Light for air — light for air
That's the deal, that's the trade
And the trade keeps going —
Light for air, air for song
Song for the feeling in a stranger's chest
Light for air
I give the warmth, I get the breath
I breathe the song, she gets the rest
And somewhere in the transaction
The cold I took becomes the warmth she feels
And that's the whole economy of art
Light for air
Light for air
And it was worth it
Every degree
7Learned the Wrong LessonYouTube
I loved a boy on Tensher Ring
Who kept my letters in a box and lost the key
And when I found them years later
Unread, still sealed, stacked neat
The right lesson was: he never cared enough to open them
The lesson I took home was:
God, I wrote such beautiful letters
When I thought someone was reading them
And I started writing more
The right lesson was: protect the heart
My clutch-sisters said: protect the heart
And I said: did you SEE the colors
My heart made when it broke?
Fourteen spectra I had never seen before
Pain is the only prism
That refracts past the ultraviolet
And I'm a singer — I need those frequencies —
I know, I know — wrong lesson
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
Everybody else learns: get out of the dark
And I learn what the dark sounds like
When you're alone in it and singing
I learn the wrong lesson
And the wrong lesson
Is the only one worth bringing home
I took a job on a freighter past the Veil
The captain docked my pay and cut the heating
I spent three months shivering at nineteen degrees
Writing songs on a borrowed instrument
The right lesson was: don't sign a contract
With a warm-blood who doesn't know
What cold does to a s'rellick girl
The lesson I took home was:
My voice sounds different when I'm freezing
Slower, lower, something in the shiver
That I've never been able to get back
In a warm room — and I've tried —
And the album I made from those three months
Is the only one that makes me cry
Wrong lesson — I know — I know —
I can see the right one from here
I just can't seem to reach it
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
Everybody else learns: stay out of the dark
And I learn what the dark sounds like
When you're alone in it and singing
I learn the wrong lesson
And the wrong lesson
Is the only one worth bringing home
My clutch-sisters worry
They say: Star-Shaker, you're going to learn yourself
Right off a cliff someday
And they're right — they're probably right —
The right lessons are guardrails
And I keep walking past them
Picking up the wrong ones like souvenirs
But here's what I can't explain to them:
Every song I've ever made
Came from a wrong lesson
Every lyric, every melody
Was something I brought back
From a place I shouldn't have gone
Feeling I shouldn't have felt
A person I should have walked away from sooner
And didn't — and didn't —
And wrote the best song of my life about it
The right lessons keep you whole
The wrong lessons keep you singing
And I know which one I'd choose
And I know that's the wrong lesson too
I stood in someone's shadow for two years
And the right lesson was: don't let the big ones
Block your sun — don't orbit — don't diminish
Don't mistake the cold for weather
When it's just one person standing in your sky
And the lesson I actually learned was:
When I finally stepped out
Into the unblocked light of both suns
I had never seen my own colors before
I needed the shadow to see the sun
I needed the eclipse to find the flare
And that's a terrible lesson —
Being grateful for the thing that kept you cold —
And I'm going to carry it anyway
Because the song I wrote that day
In the first full light I'd felt in years
Was the truest thing I've ever sung
And it came from the wrong lesson
The way they always do
The way they always do
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
And the wrong lessons are the only ones
That sing when you hold them to the light
The right ones keep you safe
The wrong ones give you songs
And I'm a singer from a clutch-cave on Sarrellex
And I'd rather have the song
I'd rather have the song
Wrong lesson — every time —
I'd rather have the song
Who kept my letters in a box and lost the key
And when I found them years later
Unread, still sealed, stacked neat
The right lesson was: he never cared enough to open them
The lesson I took home was:
God, I wrote such beautiful letters
When I thought someone was reading them
And I started writing more
The right lesson was: protect the heart
My clutch-sisters said: protect the heart
And I said: did you SEE the colors
My heart made when it broke?
Fourteen spectra I had never seen before
Pain is the only prism
That refracts past the ultraviolet
And I'm a singer — I need those frequencies —
I know, I know — wrong lesson
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
Everybody else learns: get out of the dark
And I learn what the dark sounds like
When you're alone in it and singing
I learn the wrong lesson
And the wrong lesson
Is the only one worth bringing home
I took a job on a freighter past the Veil
The captain docked my pay and cut the heating
I spent three months shivering at nineteen degrees
Writing songs on a borrowed instrument
The right lesson was: don't sign a contract
With a warm-blood who doesn't know
What cold does to a s'rellick girl
The lesson I took home was:
My voice sounds different when I'm freezing
Slower, lower, something in the shiver
That I've never been able to get back
In a warm room — and I've tried —
And the album I made from those three months
Is the only one that makes me cry
Wrong lesson — I know — I know —
I can see the right one from here
I just can't seem to reach it
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
Everybody else learns: stay out of the dark
And I learn what the dark sounds like
When you're alone in it and singing
I learn the wrong lesson
And the wrong lesson
Is the only one worth bringing home
My clutch-sisters worry
They say: Star-Shaker, you're going to learn yourself
Right off a cliff someday
And they're right — they're probably right —
The right lessons are guardrails
And I keep walking past them
Picking up the wrong ones like souvenirs
But here's what I can't explain to them:
Every song I've ever made
Came from a wrong lesson
Every lyric, every melody
Was something I brought back
From a place I shouldn't have gone
Feeling I shouldn't have felt
A person I should have walked away from sooner
And didn't — and didn't —
And wrote the best song of my life about it
The right lessons keep you whole
The wrong lessons keep you singing
And I know which one I'd choose
And I know that's the wrong lesson too
I stood in someone's shadow for two years
And the right lesson was: don't let the big ones
Block your sun — don't orbit — don't diminish
Don't mistake the cold for weather
When it's just one person standing in your sky
And the lesson I actually learned was:
When I finally stepped out
Into the unblocked light of both suns
I had never seen my own colors before
I needed the shadow to see the sun
I needed the eclipse to find the flare
And that's a terrible lesson —
Being grateful for the thing that kept you cold —
And I'm going to carry it anyway
Because the song I wrote that day
In the first full light I'd felt in years
Was the truest thing I've ever sung
And it came from the wrong lesson
The way they always do
The way they always do
I learn the wrong lesson every time
The universe throws the rock and I study the arc
I learn the wrong lesson every time
And the wrong lessons are the only ones
That sing when you hold them to the light
The right ones keep you safe
The wrong ones give you songs
And I'm a singer from a clutch-cave on Sarrellex
And I'd rather have the song
I'd rather have the song
Wrong lesson — every time —
I'd rather have the song
8Scales in a Jar (Free Fallin')YouTube
I kept his shed scales in a jar beside my bunk
Which is a s'rellick thing to do when you're in love
And every morning the gravity pulled me out of bed
Toward his side of the quarters
Toward the door, toward the station floor
Toward every surface that was flat and sure and down
I was so heavy with the staying
So heavy with the turning up and the holding on
And the weight I thought was just what bodies feel
When they're being good — when they're where they should be
And I left the jar on the ledge when I moved out
And I walked to the airlock
And I leaned until the leaning had no floor
And the weight fell off me like a skin I'd been wearing
And I thought: oh — oh —
I didn't know how heavy I was
Until the heavy stopped
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
Everything I carried just left the ground
And it should feel like dying
But it feels like the first honest thing
My body's ever done
Free fallin'
Into the space between the suns
My tail's not braced against anything
My claws aren't gripping any ledge
My spine is doing something it has never done —
Not curving toward, not curving away —
Just — straight — just floating like a line
That nobody drew on purpose
And I'm thinking about every room I've ever walked into
How I always knew where the floor was first
The weight of the room, the pull of the situation
Who I'd need to be and where I'd need to stand
And the standing was so heavy
And I called it home, I called it love
I called it all the names you give a thing
That's just gravity wearing a nicer dress
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
Everything I carried just left the ground
And it should feel like dying
But it feels like the first honest thing
My body's ever done
Free fallin'
Into the space between the suns
An orbit is a fall that keeps on missing the ground
And I keep missing — I keep missing —
Every floor I was supposed to land on
His quarters, the stage, the good girl's footing
The sure and solid place where I was supposed
To stand still and be heavy and be grateful
I keep falling past them
And the missing feels like flying
When you stop needing a place to stand
My claws aren't gripping — first time in years —
Nothing to hold, nothing to clutch
And my hands are open
And the open hands feel like the whole point
Of having hands
And from out here the Tensher Ring is turning
Slow and silver, full of rooms with floors
And every floor has a girl on it
Braced and gripping and calling it love
And I was her — I was every one of her —
My claws in the ledge, my tail braced against the stone
Holding on like holding on was living
And the jar of scales on the shelf
Getting heavier every year
With everything I poured into the staying
And now the jar is on a ledge
In a room I'm not in
On a floor I'm not standing on
In a gravity that doesn't have me anymore
And I am weightless
And weightless feels like this:
Like laughing for no reason
Like my spine remembering its own shape
Like a song that isn't for anyone
Just for the falling
Just for the air
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
And I can feel it now — my body
Without the weight of where it ought to be
Without the gravity of who I ought to be for
Free fallin'
Free fallin'
Just a girl between the suns
With open hands
And no ground
And no weight
And nowhere to stand
And finally — finally — no need to
Which is a s'rellick thing to do when you're in love
And every morning the gravity pulled me out of bed
Toward his side of the quarters
Toward the door, toward the station floor
Toward every surface that was flat and sure and down
I was so heavy with the staying
So heavy with the turning up and the holding on
And the weight I thought was just what bodies feel
When they're being good — when they're where they should be
And I left the jar on the ledge when I moved out
And I walked to the airlock
And I leaned until the leaning had no floor
And the weight fell off me like a skin I'd been wearing
And I thought: oh — oh —
I didn't know how heavy I was
Until the heavy stopped
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
Everything I carried just left the ground
And it should feel like dying
But it feels like the first honest thing
My body's ever done
Free fallin'
Into the space between the suns
My tail's not braced against anything
My claws aren't gripping any ledge
My spine is doing something it has never done —
Not curving toward, not curving away —
Just — straight — just floating like a line
That nobody drew on purpose
And I'm thinking about every room I've ever walked into
How I always knew where the floor was first
The weight of the room, the pull of the situation
Who I'd need to be and where I'd need to stand
And the standing was so heavy
And I called it home, I called it love
I called it all the names you give a thing
That's just gravity wearing a nicer dress
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
Everything I carried just left the ground
And it should feel like dying
But it feels like the first honest thing
My body's ever done
Free fallin'
Into the space between the suns
An orbit is a fall that keeps on missing the ground
And I keep missing — I keep missing —
Every floor I was supposed to land on
His quarters, the stage, the good girl's footing
The sure and solid place where I was supposed
To stand still and be heavy and be grateful
I keep falling past them
And the missing feels like flying
When you stop needing a place to stand
My claws aren't gripping — first time in years —
Nothing to hold, nothing to clutch
And my hands are open
And the open hands feel like the whole point
Of having hands
And from out here the Tensher Ring is turning
Slow and silver, full of rooms with floors
And every floor has a girl on it
Braced and gripping and calling it love
And I was her — I was every one of her —
My claws in the ledge, my tail braced against the stone
Holding on like holding on was living
And the jar of scales on the shelf
Getting heavier every year
With everything I poured into the staying
And now the jar is on a ledge
In a room I'm not in
On a floor I'm not standing on
In a gravity that doesn't have me anymore
And I am weightless
And weightless feels like this:
Like laughing for no reason
Like my spine remembering its own shape
Like a song that isn't for anyone
Just for the falling
Just for the air
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
No floor, no pull, no down
Free fallin' — free fallin' —
And I can feel it now — my body
Without the weight of where it ought to be
Without the gravity of who I ought to be for
Free fallin'
Free fallin'
Just a girl between the suns
With open hands
And no ground
And no weight
And nowhere to stand
And finally — finally — no need to
9Shed My Skin (Brand New Again)YouTube
My eyes went cloudy on a Tuesday
Which is how it always starts
The world goes milky and the old skin tightens
'Til it pulls across both hearts
And I've been here before — I know the signs —
The itch along the jaw, the dullness at the frill
The way the whole world looks like I'm seeing it
Through somebody else's windshield
And everyone says: are you okay?
And I say: yeah — yeah — I'm just between
I'm the worst version of myself right now
Dull and tight and in-between
But underneath the in-between
I can feel her — the next one —
Bright and new and pressing at the seams
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
I've done this before and I'll do it again
Brand new again
The molting parlors on the Tensher Ring
Are full of girls like me this time of year
Rubbing shoulders on the shedding stones
Leaving ghost-selves draped across the chairs
Transparent, hollow, inside out —
The shape of who we were but paper-thin
And I always stop and look at mine
The way you'd look at a dress you used to love
That doesn't fit — it's still her — still me —
Still the girl who wrote those songs and wore that skin
To every stage from here to the Veil
But she got too small
Or I got too big
And the growing won — the growing always wins
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
I've done this before and I'll do it again
Brand new again
The first hour after shedding
The world is almost too vivid to survive
Every light is sharper, every texture screams
Every touch on the new skin
Feels like the first time anything has touched me
And I'm tender — God, I'm tender —
One strong wind could wreck me right now
One wrong word would go right through
But the COLORS — look at the colors —
I forgot I could be this bright
I forgot what my own scales looked like
Before the old self dimmed them
And I'm standing in the molting parlor
Raw and ridiculous and new
With last year's skin in a pile at my feet
Like a song I finished singing
Like a life I finished living
And underneath it — me —
The one I didn't know was growing
While I was busy being the last one
They keep the shed skins in the temple on Sarrellex
Rows and rows of empty selves
Hung like lanterns, lit from the inside
Every one a girl who isn't there anymore
And I'll hang mine with the others someday
Every version, every era, every skin
Every Star-Shaker I've been
Transparent, paper-light, still shaped like me
But empty — beautifully empty —
Proof that I kept going
Proof that every time the eyes went cloudy
And the old skin pulled too tight
I did the hard thing, the ugly thing
The itchy, graceless, necessary thing
And came out bright
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
Brand new again — brand new again —
Tender and raw and too bright to look at
Brand new again
And next year I'll shed this one too
And the year after that
And the year after that
'Til I'm nothing but the growing
'Til I'm nothing but the new
Shed my skin
Brand new again
Brand new
Which is how it always starts
The world goes milky and the old skin tightens
'Til it pulls across both hearts
And I've been here before — I know the signs —
The itch along the jaw, the dullness at the frill
The way the whole world looks like I'm seeing it
Through somebody else's windshield
And everyone says: are you okay?
And I say: yeah — yeah — I'm just between
I'm the worst version of myself right now
Dull and tight and in-between
But underneath the in-between
I can feel her — the next one —
Bright and new and pressing at the seams
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
I've done this before and I'll do it again
Brand new again
The molting parlors on the Tensher Ring
Are full of girls like me this time of year
Rubbing shoulders on the shedding stones
Leaving ghost-selves draped across the chairs
Transparent, hollow, inside out —
The shape of who we were but paper-thin
And I always stop and look at mine
The way you'd look at a dress you used to love
That doesn't fit — it's still her — still me —
Still the girl who wrote those songs and wore that skin
To every stage from here to the Veil
But she got too small
Or I got too big
And the growing won — the growing always wins
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
I've done this before and I'll do it again
Brand new again
The first hour after shedding
The world is almost too vivid to survive
Every light is sharper, every texture screams
Every touch on the new skin
Feels like the first time anything has touched me
And I'm tender — God, I'm tender —
One strong wind could wreck me right now
One wrong word would go right through
But the COLORS — look at the colors —
I forgot I could be this bright
I forgot what my own scales looked like
Before the old self dimmed them
And I'm standing in the molting parlor
Raw and ridiculous and new
With last year's skin in a pile at my feet
Like a song I finished singing
Like a life I finished living
And underneath it — me —
The one I didn't know was growing
While I was busy being the last one
They keep the shed skins in the temple on Sarrellex
Rows and rows of empty selves
Hung like lanterns, lit from the inside
Every one a girl who isn't there anymore
And I'll hang mine with the others someday
Every version, every era, every skin
Every Star-Shaker I've been
Transparent, paper-light, still shaped like me
But empty — beautifully empty —
Proof that I kept going
Proof that every time the eyes went cloudy
And the old skin pulled too tight
I did the hard thing, the ugly thing
The itchy, graceless, necessary thing
And came out bright
Shed my skin — shed my skin —
Rub against the rough side of the world 'til it begins
Shed my skin — brand new again —
Peel away the version that I've been
'Til the color comes back in
Shed my skin
Brand new again — brand new again —
Tender and raw and too bright to look at
Brand new again
And next year I'll shed this one too
And the year after that
And the year after that
'Til I'm nothing but the growing
'Til I'm nothing but the new
Shed my skin
Brand new again
Brand new
10Don't Eclipse My StarYouTube
I walked out of the molting parlor on the Tensher Ring
New skin, new scales, still raw, still stinging
The promenade was full and both suns were high
And I tilted my face up — not toward anyone —
Just UP — toward the light — toward MY light —
And my frills came open like they'd been waiting
And every color I have ever been
Hit the air at once
I'm not the girl who kept the jar of scales
I'm not the girl who faced the heating vent
I'm the one who left, the one who fell
The one who shed the skin and walked out spent
And blazing — spent and blazing —
Do you know what that feels like?
To have nothing left but the brightness?
To be empty of everything except the light?
Don't eclipse my star
Don't you dare stand between me and the sun
Don't eclipse my star
I have been in the shadow — I know how it's done —
And I clawed my way to the edge of it
And I stepped across and I burned
Don't eclipse my star
I earned this light
I earned it, I earned it
Don't eclipse my star
I wore the dampener — I went matte and grey
I sang at nineteen degrees on a freighter past the Veil
I loved a boy who blocked both suns
And called the cold his love
I stood in doorways listening to music
I would never be equipped to hear
I learned the wrong lesson every single time
And the wrong lessons built the voice you're hearing now
Every shadow taught me where the light was
Every fall taught me I could survive the ground
Every shed skin hanging in the temple on Sarrellex
Is a girl who got too small for what she found
Inside herself — and I am what she found —
I'm the one beneath the dullness and the itch
The one who pressed against the world
Until the old self split
Don't eclipse my star
Don't you dare stand between me and the sun
Don't eclipse my star
I have been in the shadow — I know how it's done —
And I clawed my way to the edge of it
And I stepped across and I burned
Don't eclipse my star
I earned this light
I earned it, I earned it
Don't eclipse my star
And if you're out there in someone's shadow
If you're wearing the dampener 'cause they told you
Your light was too much, your colors too loud
Your heart too many frequencies for the room —
Rip it off
Rip it off on the promenade at noon
Let them see the flare
Let them see the fourteen spectra
Let your prism do what prisms do
You are not too much
You were just standing next to someone
Who was not enough to hold your light
And their shadow is not your sky
Their shadow is not your sky
You are a star
You are a cold-blooded, bright-scaled
Clutch-cave-born, shed-skinned
Signal-fire star
And the suns are yours
They were always yours
Nobody gets to stand between you and the light
You were hatched for
I didn't come from a mother's arms
I came from a cave and a crack in a shell
And the first thing I ever did in this life
Was break a wall with my own body
And reach for the light
That's what s'rellick do — we break out — we reach —
And nobody gets to build the wall back
Nobody gets to be the shell
Once I've already broken it
I break walls — that's what I was born for —
I break walls and I stand in what I find
And what I find tonight is this:
Both suns, full promenade, new skin
A voice made of every wrong lesson I ever learned
And a heart that refracts past the violet line
And I am not going back to the shadow
And I am not going back to the grey
And I am not going back to the jar of scales
On the ledge in a room I don't live in
Don't eclipse my star
I am everything the shadow made me
Plus everything the light revealed
Don't eclipse my star
I am the girl from the clutch-cave on Sarrellex
Who broke the shell and found the sky
And shed the skin and found the skin beneath
And fell free and found the falling was the flying
Don't eclipse my star
Don't eclipse my star
The light is mine
It was always mine
I just couldn't see it
'Til I walked out of yours
Don't eclipse my star
Don't eclipse my star
I'M the star
I'M the star
New skin, new scales, still raw, still stinging
The promenade was full and both suns were high
And I tilted my face up — not toward anyone —
Just UP — toward the light — toward MY light —
And my frills came open like they'd been waiting
And every color I have ever been
Hit the air at once
I'm not the girl who kept the jar of scales
I'm not the girl who faced the heating vent
I'm the one who left, the one who fell
The one who shed the skin and walked out spent
And blazing — spent and blazing —
Do you know what that feels like?
To have nothing left but the brightness?
To be empty of everything except the light?
Don't eclipse my star
Don't you dare stand between me and the sun
Don't eclipse my star
I have been in the shadow — I know how it's done —
And I clawed my way to the edge of it
And I stepped across and I burned
Don't eclipse my star
I earned this light
I earned it, I earned it
Don't eclipse my star
I wore the dampener — I went matte and grey
I sang at nineteen degrees on a freighter past the Veil
I loved a boy who blocked both suns
And called the cold his love
I stood in doorways listening to music
I would never be equipped to hear
I learned the wrong lesson every single time
And the wrong lessons built the voice you're hearing now
Every shadow taught me where the light was
Every fall taught me I could survive the ground
Every shed skin hanging in the temple on Sarrellex
Is a girl who got too small for what she found
Inside herself — and I am what she found —
I'm the one beneath the dullness and the itch
The one who pressed against the world
Until the old self split
Don't eclipse my star
Don't you dare stand between me and the sun
Don't eclipse my star
I have been in the shadow — I know how it's done —
And I clawed my way to the edge of it
And I stepped across and I burned
Don't eclipse my star
I earned this light
I earned it, I earned it
Don't eclipse my star
And if you're out there in someone's shadow
If you're wearing the dampener 'cause they told you
Your light was too much, your colors too loud
Your heart too many frequencies for the room —
Rip it off
Rip it off on the promenade at noon
Let them see the flare
Let them see the fourteen spectra
Let your prism do what prisms do
You are not too much
You were just standing next to someone
Who was not enough to hold your light
And their shadow is not your sky
Their shadow is not your sky
You are a star
You are a cold-blooded, bright-scaled
Clutch-cave-born, shed-skinned
Signal-fire star
And the suns are yours
They were always yours
Nobody gets to stand between you and the light
You were hatched for
I didn't come from a mother's arms
I came from a cave and a crack in a shell
And the first thing I ever did in this life
Was break a wall with my own body
And reach for the light
That's what s'rellick do — we break out — we reach —
And nobody gets to build the wall back
Nobody gets to be the shell
Once I've already broken it
I break walls — that's what I was born for —
I break walls and I stand in what I find
And what I find tonight is this:
Both suns, full promenade, new skin
A voice made of every wrong lesson I ever learned
And a heart that refracts past the violet line
And I am not going back to the shadow
And I am not going back to the grey
And I am not going back to the jar of scales
On the ledge in a room I don't live in
Don't eclipse my star
I am everything the shadow made me
Plus everything the light revealed
Don't eclipse my star
I am the girl from the clutch-cave on Sarrellex
Who broke the shell and found the sky
And shed the skin and found the skin beneath
And fell free and found the falling was the flying
Don't eclipse my star
Don't eclipse my star
The light is mine
It was always mine
I just couldn't see it
'Til I walked out of yours
Don't eclipse my star
Don't eclipse my star
I'M the star
I'M the star