Currency of Scars

Intro

Gym light buzzing over a ring with no name

Uncle kept a ledger, wrote wins next to pain

Said the belt don't feed you, the split lip might

Every scar's a receipt for a losing fight

Verse 1

Sixteen, taped my hands with a torn bedsheet

Promoter paid in cash for the rounds I could eat

Split my brow open, called it a signing fee

Mama's rent came out the swelling under my eye

Fought a man twice my size for a hundred flat

Took the elbow to the jaw, still walked home like that

Every Friday the gym smelled like iron and sweat

Uncle wrote the tally, said don't nobody forget

Scar above the eyebrow bought the light bill paid

Knuckle split like lightning, bought my sister's grade

Learned to read a face by the way it holds a bruise

Cut man taught me silence is the price you choose

Canvas soaked in stories nobody wrote down

Champion belts rust, but the marks stay around

I traded skin for grocery, traded blood for bread

Currency of scars keeps the wolf from the door instead

Chorus

Currency of scars, that's the only cash I hold

Every mark I'm wearing already paid the toll

Can't spend it at the counter but it buys you proof

Currency of scars, that's the honest truth

Verse 2

Now I run the gym, uncle left me the key

Ledger's still in the drawer, ink faded but I see

Kids come in swinging like the rent's already due

I hand them gauze and say the same thing he told me too

Round two, split lip, keep your hands up high

Round four, cracked rib, don't you dare ask why

Some come from shelters, some from empty plates

I write their names in margins, call it interest rates

Paid my daughter's tuition off a cut man's wage

St