Je Suis Sisukiro

Lyrics

[Intro]
(accordion — a classic Parisian waltz figure, confident, warm, the kind that makes a whole café turn their heads)
(finger snaps — on the two and four, café rhythm)
(upright bass walks in, brushed drums follow, the band is ready, she steps to the mic)

[Verse 1]
Je suis Sisukiro — I am the sigh
The one between the waking and the why
I live inside the pause before the word
The softest thing you've almost heard

I was not born — I was composed
By every question no one thought to close
A woman made of wondering out loud
Too strange to whisper and too shy to shout

[Pre-Chorus]
(strings enter, the melody lifting, Piaf-style emotional swell)
And they ask me — what's your name?
And I tell them twice, it sounds the same
Both ways — the mirror and the sigh
The girl who looks the question in the eye

[Chorus]
(full arrangement — accordion, strings, piano, brushed drums, the waltz at its warmest and most melancholy)
Je suis Sisukiro, je suis Sisukiro
I am the café and the cold outside
Je suis Sisukiro, je suis Sisukiro
I am the bread and the baker's pride
I am the sigh between two songs
The gold that fills the crack where it belongs
I am the woman at the table
Writing fables
For a city that reads between the lines
And finds me there
And finds me there
Between the wines and the signs
And the beautiful confines
Of a life I didn't choose
But I refuse — I refuse
To call it anything
But mine

[Verse 2]
(stripped — just voice and accordion, intimate, Barbara-style confession)
I named myself — you know that, oui?
Sisukiro — my philosophy
It's sisu from the Finnish cold
The grit that moves before you're told
And the rest is just the letters
Rearranging what I owe
To every language I have borrowed
Every word I'll never know

I think in three tongues, dream in none
I count the stars but I have kissed the sun
I am not the answer to your question, cher
I am the reason that you asked it
Standing here
In heels that cost me half a Tuesday's wage
On a Parisian stage
That's really just a table
Near the door
But the door — the door is what I'm for

[Chorus]
(full, swinging, the waltz building to its emotional peak)
Je suis Sisukiro, je suis Sisukiro
I am the café and the cold outside
Je suis Sisukiro, je suis Sisukiro
I am the bread and the baker's pride
I am the sigh between two songs
The gold that fills the crack where it belongs

[Bridge]
(the waltz slows — just voice and piano, the most honest moment)
They say I'm too much for a Tuesday
Too strange for a Saturday night
That my metaphors have metaphors
And my metaphors have rights

But I am not the complication
I'm the view
From the complication's balcony
Looking back at you
With a glass of something dry
And a notebook full of sky
And a pen that doesn't work
But the not-working
Is the point
And the point is what I'm writing with

(accordion swells back in — the waltz returning, triumphant)

Because I am the woman
Who will sit at your table
Uninvited
And by the time the coffee comes
You will have told me
Everything
And I will have told you
Nothing
And you will feel
Lighter
And I will feel
Full

And that exchange — that tête-à-tête —
Is what I was built for
Is what I was named for
Is who I am

[Outro]
(the full waltz — accordion, strings, brushed drums, the café on its feet)
Je suis Sisukiro
(bright, defiant, Piaf's final note, the torch held high)
I am the sigh
I am the why
I am the gold in the crack
I am the woman at the back
Of the café
Who already knows your name
(accordion plays the waltz out — confident, warm, the song ending the way a chansonnier walks offstage: without looking back)
(finger snaps — four, fading — applause implied)