They placed a crown in a child’s hands,
Said, This is yours by right,
Forged from vows and older wars,
Still warm from someone’s fight.
Every name I carry down the years
Was paid in blood and bone,
I did not choose these echoes loud,
Yet I must answer them alone.
Inheritance is a burden before it is a gift,
A chain disguised as flame,
It teaches you to stand upright
While carrying someone else’s blame.
They call it honor, legacy,
As if it sets you free—
Inheritance is a burden before it is a gift,
And now it’s living in me.
The roads I walk were built on grief,
The laws on broken oaths,
I hear the dead in every stone,
Their breath inside my growth.
What we receive is never clean,
It comes with debts unseen,
The past does not ask if you are ready—
It only asks to be redeemed.
Inheritance is a burden before it is a gift,
Before the blessing, there’s the scar,
You learn who you must protect
By learning who you are.
If I choose to carry it forward,
I’ll do so wide awake—
For inheritance becomes a gift at last
Only by the choices that we make.
