Questions... After questions... after questions
Is it worth it? am I?
What if I didn't exist? Shall I?
Pain. Why is it endless? Shall I end it?
Flashbacks. Why did I go through that?
Happiness... when? Where? How?
Questions... after questions... after questions
Love. What is it? Where's mine?
Peace... must be death... right?
Fear. Why the constant fear?
Questions, after questions... after questions.

Why do the stars seem brighter when you’re far from home?
How is it possible to feel so much and still be empty?
Was my love too heavy, or were you just afraid?
What if I’m always too much and never enough, like the way the sky bleeds at sunset?
Do you picture my tears like confetti?
Were the vibes sublime?

Why does the thought of you getting engaged on Facebook
make me want to throw up pretty bushes?
Why did I feel I was asking too much, when all I ever
wanted was for you to mean what you said?
Is longing always this loud, or am I the only one screaming?

How do we keep going when hope is just a rumor we tell ourselves at 3 a.m.?
When did we decide that falling apart had to be done quietly?
What if love is less like falling and more like standing
outside a door I’m too afraid to open?

What does your therapist think about me?
How long have you been saying my name in that room,
throwing it against the walls like something you can’t figure out?
Did you lie to me, or was it yourself you couldn’t face?
What if the map we’ve been following was drawn by hands that never touched?
What if we never touch?

Remember ten years ago, before this got so knotted,
we were learning lines in basements and smoking cloves behind the theater?
Did you think you’d be the one I shatter for?
Why does happiness feel like something I’m never allowed to keep?
What if time doesn’t soften the edges but teaches us how to carry the sharpness?

Why do the faces in old photographs seem to know something we don’t?
Is there a difference between being brave and being reckless,
or does it all depend on how the story ends?
What was the tipping point, the moment you shut down the parade?
What was the endgame? Why was it a game at all?
How many times have you pressed your ear to the silence,
hoping it might tell you something new?

Why does the idea of forever sound like both a promise and a threat?
How do I stop feeling like you’re the only poem I write?
Have you read the poems about you?
Are they easy to decode? Are they eating you alive?
Do you want to be eaten?

Do you ever wonder if the fire was always just fire?
What if the love I gave wasn’t meant for you,
but for the version of me that needed something to believe in?
Was I crossing a line, or was I drawing one?
What if I never stop mourning something I made up?

How do you carry an atlas under your tongue?
Does my voice still sound like a howl? Does it pierce your night?
Did you really have to detonate us two weeks before the release of The Tortured Poets Department?
Will the story of us linger like smoke in those songs forever?
What do you think about when you think of me—my voice echoing off the walls,
my *** in leggings, or my ceaseless need to be seen?
Will I ever stop dreaming about you?
Why do I know it’s been exactly 200 days since it happened?
Who’s counting?

How do we reconcile the person we thought we’d be with the one we see in the mirror at 3 a.m., wide-eyed and wondering?
What did you get out of keeping me in your orbit, spinning in circles while you stood still?
Why does your name still taste like blood when I say it out loud?
Will I ever stop wondering why I wasn’t enough?
What if the real betrayal was how easily you let me believe it was my fault?

If my heart is an ocean
Gone unexplored
Then why is it here?

I try to drain it
Make it palatable
Because on its own, it feels like too much

Layers upon layers
Light, deep blue, darker
I'm not sure where the bottom is

It's got to be for something

I've got to feel for something

They reach out their hand
And trail their fingers over the surface
Not seeking further depth
I hate that I do the same
I don't invite them in.

If my heart is but an ocean gone unexplored
Then why is it here?

I wonder what Jesus would say,
If he found out today,
That the cross, where he hung, torn and bruised,
Has become our most sacred jewel.

Would he gaze at the wood with surprise,
See his pain in our reverent eyes?
Would he question the meaning we found,
In a tool meant to press him down?

The nails that pierced through his skin,
The crown that dug deep within.
A death we immortalize in form,
But forget it was born in the storm.

I wonder, would he smile or weep,
At this symbol we carry so deep.
And ask if we’ve missed the point,
Where flesh met iron, and faith disjoint?

Would he ask why we cling so tight,
To the image of his final night?
Why we exalt the end of his breath,
And make a monument of death?

Is this the legacy he would choose—
A symbol of all that he’d lose?
Does eternity shrink or expand,
With a cross gripped in every hand?

I wonder if he’d feel estranged,
From the meaning we’ve rearranged—
To worship the gallows, the nails, the pain,
And not the life that rose again.

Don't we live in a world
that is round? Why then,
do we say: "They came
from all the corners of the earth?"
Question everything, now that's sound!

Trust, without evidence.
Belief, without proof.
Faith, without God.
And yet, here I am,
And here I will be.
How foolish am I?
Are we?
Very.