The Recipe for a Heartbeat

Thirty candles on a cake that isn't mine

Another year gone by in a blurry crooked line

They say the clock is ticking loud against the wall

But I'm just trying to stand up straight after the fall

I wear my heart on my sleeve stained with flour and dust

Trusting people who don't deserve half of my trust

Looking in the mirror pinching at the waist

Wondering why love always leaves such a bitter taste

Is there a manual I missed a page I forgot to turn

Or is this just another lesson I have to burn

The world wants a silhouette a picture-perfect frame

But I'm a messy sketch refusing to play the game

I hide behind the sweetness the sugar and the cream

Painting over cracks in a fragile waking dream

You walked in like a storm uninvited rude and cold

Breaking all the china rewriting stories told

I didn't ask for a hero I didn't ask for a hand

Just someone who could see me and maybe understand

That beneath this loud laughter and the clumsy heavy stride

There's a little girl just waiting with nowhere left to hide

I'm mixing in the salt with the honey and the spice

Rolling the dice paying the price never thinking twice

They call it desperate I call it being alive

In a world of plastic dolls somehow I survive

This is the recipe for a heartbeat messy and unplanned

Rising in the heat slipping through my hand

It's not what I ordered it's not what I thought I'd need

But it's growing in the garden a wild and stubborn weed

I might not fit the glass slipper I might break the mold

But this story isn't finished it's barely being told

So let the oven burn let the timer ring

I'm finding my own voice and I'm starting to sing

Walking up these stairs carrying the weight of the past

Wondering how long a promise is actually meant to last

You said something cruel but your eyes said something else

A contradiction sitting on the dusty mood shelves

I'm tired of the waiting for a ship that never sails

I'm done with reading fairytales where the princess never fails

I'll write my own ending with a pen that's running dry

And I'll laugh at the thunder rolling across the sky

Maybe I'm too loud maybe I'm too much

Craving a connection a simple human touch

But I won't apologize for taking up this space

For the tears and the chocolate smeared across my face

Real love isn't perfect it's sticky and it's real

And it's the only thing that teaches you how to feel

This is the recipe for a heartbeat messy and unplanned

Rising in the heat slipping through my hand

It's not what I ordered it's not what I thought I'd need

But it's growing in the garden a wild and stubborn weed

I might not fit the glass slipper I might break the mold

But this story isn't finished it's barely being told

So let the oven burn let the timer ring

I'm finding my own voice and I'm starting to sing

Yeah just let it rise

Let it fill the room

Sweet smell of survival