Verse 1
Whoever curled your hair for school
Or maybe never learned how to,
Maybe mornings came too fast
And she just slept right through.
Whoever never packed your lunch,
Never signed the paper back,
Never showed up front row center
Clapping in the bleachers’ black—
Pre-Chorus
You only saw what wasn’t there,
Not what she didn’t know…
Chorus
Call her mother.
Call her by her name.
Call the girl she used to be
Before the fear and shame.
Call the child who raised herself
And never learned to choose.
Call her mother —
She was winging it like you.
Verse 2
Whoever ran in survival mode
With you right by her side,
Counting change and swallowing pride,
Trying not to cry.
Whoever married off at fifteen,
Still a baby in a dress,
Traded childhood for a promise
And a lifetime of “I guess.”
Pre-Chorus
You only saw the broken parts,
Not what she survived…
Chorus
Call her mother.
Call her by her name.
Call the girl who grew up fast
Inside a house of flame.
Call the soul who did her best
With tools she didn’t choose.
Call her mother —
Even when she got it wrong with you.
Bridge
Whoever made a deal to get straight,
Fought demons in the night,
Whoever lives with quiet guilt
And still wakes up to fight.
Whoever didn’t give you
What you needed then —
She may have been a wounded child
Trying to pretend.
And whoever you can’t stand to face,
Whose voice still cuts like glass —
There’s a story underneath it
That happened in her past.
Final Chorus
Call her mother.
Call her human first.
Call the history in her bones,
The hunger and the hurt.
Call the girl who never healed
And passed it down to you.
Call her mother —
The damage and the truth.