The Life You Gave Me

I wore the dress they chose for me

Smiled from the place they set aside

Told my reflection nothing was missing

Till even the mirror learned the lie

Every beautiful day I lived

Was another room without a door

You looked beyond the name they gave me

And saw the woman I was hiding for

There were no promises in your hands

No perfect future we could claim

Still, every tomorrow I had known

Felt less certain than your flame

The life you gave me, I will live

With every breath that’s mine to take

You never gave me forever

You gave me a life that was finally mine

I loved the one I couldn’t choose

And in your love, I found my freedom

No one will ever own again

This heart of mine, this road ahead

Or the woman you awakened

I left the shoes that never fit

And felt the midnight beneath my feet

For once, not knowing where I’d go

Made every open road feel sweet

Even silence beside you

Never closed its hands around me

Every time you touched my skin

I heard a voice say, “I want to live”

I chose one moment that was ours

Over years that asked me to pretend

I was no longer half-asleep

Or too afraid to lose the end

The life you gave me, I will choose

With both my hands and all my heart

You never promised me forever

You showed me who I’d been from the start

Even with nowhere left to return

Your memory will never be my prison

The night you held me in your arms

I lived for no one else but me

And trembled with the truth of it

If we had reached another morning

And I had woken by your side

I would have loved our smallest quarrels

And every silver year of life

But I won’t paint the days we lost

With nothing but the color of sorrow

The woman you gave your life to save

Was never meant to live in tears

Stand again

Choose again

Take the future no one owns

Whenever I can hear your voice

I find the strength to be reborn

The life you gave me, I will live

Until I’ve lived it to the end

Even in a world without you

There are mornings I have never seen

I’ll turn the love I could not keep

Into the pride that keeps me moving

Through every season still to come

No one will ever take this heart

You never gave me forever

You gave me a life that was finally mine

And as the woman that you loved

I will live beautifully

When I have lived all there is to live

And softly close my eyes someday

There is one thing I’ll tell you first

I wasn’t waiting

I was living

The life you gave me