Kintsugi

Intro

Kin-tsu-gi... kin-tsu-gi...

(Broken, not gone)

Verse 1

I was porcelain, polished to a shine,

Every surface perfect, every edge in line.

Then the floor came rushing, and I heard the sound —

Krrk! — a thousand pieces scattered on the ground.

I tried to hide the damage, tried to glue it clean,

Praying no one noticed where the breaks had been.

Pre-Chorus

But the old hands told me, as they gathered every shard:

"Child, we don't erase the breaking — we illuminate the scars."

Chorus

Pour the gold into the cracks,

I'm not going back, I'm not going back.

Every fault line turns to light,

Ōgon running through the night.

I was broken, now I'm more —

Worth more shattered than I ever was before.

Kin-tsu-gi... (gold in the veins)

Kin-tsu-gi... (I wear my flaws like flames)

Verse 2

Lacquer on my edges, urushi and fire,

Every seam a story, rising ever higher.

You can trace the fractures like a river's bend,

Golden rivers running where I broke and had to mend.

I don't miss the mirror of the man I was,

Smooth and whole and empty — perfect just because.

Pre-Chorus

Now the light gets in me through the places I was torn,

And I shine the brightest where I once was worn.

Chorus

Pour the gold into the cracks,

I'm not going back, I'm not going back.

Every fault line turns to light,

Ōgon running through the night.

I was broken, now I'm more —

Worth more shattered than I ever was before.

Kin-tsu-gi... (gold in the veins)

Kin-tsu-gi... (I wear my flaws like flames)

Bridge

Kokoro... my heart in fragments, held by golden thread.

Kokoro... I am the vessel and the light it sheds.

Don't repair me to the way I was —

Rebuild me into something else.

(Something else, something else...)

Drop

Kin! Tsu! Gi!

(Gold! Gold! Gold in the cracks!)

Kin! Tsu! Gi!

(More than I was! More than I was!)

Final Chorus

Final Chorus

Pour the gold into the cracks,

No, I'm never going back, never going back.

Every scar a stroke of light,

Ōgon burning through the night.

I was broken — now I'm more,

Worth more shattered than I ever was before.

Outro

Kin-tsu-gi... kin-tsu-gi...

(Broken, not gone... golden, reborn)