Distorted In Her Eyes

She looks at me and only

sees resilience

I'm barely intact,

but she never believes it

I've done so much wrong,

still no wrong in her vision

I was her hero first,

with the villain still written She

spoke about me like she read

ahead Found better meanings in the

things she misread She thought each

chapter brought me closer to becoming

A better man who hadn't happened

I was better in your eyes

Every warning had a reason,

every flaw was redefined You saw

someone worth believing,

I let you keep deciding Who

I was and who I'd be,

'til the story changed its mind

Now I barely know the man

distorted in your eyes

Distorted in your eyes

The ink was still wet

while you read through every word

You said I looked pretty when

I lied, I swore it was

absurd But every page repeated what

I promised I had learned You

kept crying for the real me,

but he never got his turn

You stopped reading between lines I

never meant to write Stopped mistaking

my regret for proof I'd make

it right You quit waiting for

the part where I became someone

new And started seeing who I

was by what I put you

through Then I got darker in

your eyes

Every promise sounded practiced,

every truth arrived disguised You saw

someone who needs saving,

not a man who knows to

love Someone reaching for a connection

just to prove he still belongs

I can't swear that you were

wrong, but I can't say you

got it right There's still someone

here inside distorted in your eyes

Everybody gets a Tyler who can

carry any room Funny,

reckless, full of depth with nothing

showing through But the mirror gets

the silence when the performance ends

Counts every contradiction I rename as

self-defense I search for who I

want to be somewhere inside the

frame But who I've been looks

back at me and says,

"You'll stay the same" There's who

the whole world thinks I am,

what the reflection gives me back

Then the man I feel inside

still fighting to become fact

There are strangers in my eyes

The one they cheer,

the one reflected,

and the one I keep inside

Maybe you were right to judge

me by the things I couldn't

change But I won't call myself

incapable because I caused you pain

I'm still more than what you

read, still less than what I

advertise Just a man still being

written, distorted in your eyes

Maybe I'm not who you believed

or everything you now describe Maybe

I'm somewhere in between

Distorted in your eyes