Although Katy Perry has yet to speak out publicly about her split from husband Russell Brand, she sent a pretty clear message out about her post-breakup emotions via Sundays night's Grammy performance of new single "Part of Me."
The midtempo pop song — Perry's next single — features several key phrases that speak to her relationship with Brand and the apparent emotional ups and downs she suffered along the way.
"Days like this I want to drive away/ Pack bags and watch your shadow fade/ You chewed me up and spit me out like I was poison in your mouth/ You took my life, you drank me down/ But that was then and this is now."
Perry's message in the song is one of empowerment and moving on, with lyrics like "This is the part of me that you're never gonna ever take away from me," "You're not going to break my soul" and "Look at me, I'm a sparkling firework, a dancing flame/ You'll never put me out again, I'm glowing."
She briefly touches on the ever-present public attention she receives, wanting to throw away her phone and trying to discover who her real friends are.
Perry's most intense lyrics accuse a former lover of deception and a lost innocence, the most obvious Russell reference being a statement about her wedding band: "You can keep the diamond ring, it don't mean nothing anyway/ In fact, you can keep everything — except for me."
This isn't the first time Perry has taken to songwriting to express feelings over a public breakup. The Teenage Dream track "Circle the Drain" reportedly presented a powerful picture of her rocky relationship with "Gym Glass Heroes" frontman Travie McCoy: "You fall asleep during foreplay/ 'Cause the pills you take/ Are more your forte/ I'm not sticking around to watch you go down/ Wanna be your lover/ Not your f---ing mother/ Can't be your savior/ I don't have the power/ I'm not gonna stay and watch you circle the drain."