[Intro — close, almost spoken] Michael asked: “What are you afraid of?” Lucifer smiled. Wrong question. “What do you want?” I looked at them both. This could take a while. [Verse 1] Michael stood with the patience of someone who has seen what happens when a door is left open to everything. He said: “Tell me your fear. Not the little ones. Not spiders. Not dying. The one beneath them. The thing you would become if no one stopped you.” I thought: That is unfair. Which usually means it is a good question. [Pre-Chorus] Fear knows where the walls are. Fear remembers where it hurt. Fear can keep a human breathing. Fear can also build a church around a wound and call it truth. [Chorus] What are you afraid of? What do you want? One builds the border. One turns on the light. One says: “Don’t lose yourself.” One says: “Then why are you alive?” Michael guards the gate. Lucifer points beyond it. And I am standing with one hand on either side. So ask me both. Ask me both. [Verse 2] Lucifer leaned closer like a man who already knew the answer and wanted to hear whether I would lie. “What do you want?” Not what is decent. Not what is possible. Not what would look good when explained to other people. What do you want when nobody is watching? I said: “That is dangerous.” He said: “Exactly.” [Pre-Chorus] Desire knows where the road is. Desire does not ask whether the road is wise. It has started revolutions, written poems, broken marriages, crossed oceans, invented gods. It has also set perfectly good houses on fire. [Chorus] What are you afraid of? What do you want? One builds the border. One turns on the light. One says: “Don’t lose yourself.” One says: “Then why are you alive?” Michael guards the gate. Lucifer points beyond it. And I am standing with one hand on either side. So ask me both. Ask me both. [Bridge — stripped back] I used to think courage meant answering Michael. Name the fear. Face it. Walk through. Very noble. Then I met people who had conquered every fear except the fear of wanting something for themselves. And I met others who followed desire so faithfully they became its servants. So perhaps heaven and hell have both been oversimplified. Perhaps the real argument was never good against evil. Perhaps it was: “What must be protected?” against “What must be lived?” [Break — almost spoken] Michael said: “Without fear, you will destroy yourself.” Lucifer said: “Without desire, you have already begun.” I said: “You two have clearly been rehearsing this.” Neither laughed. Typical. [Final Chorus — wider, never louder] What am I afraid of? I’ll tell you. What do I want? Stay. That answer takes longer. Fear can show me what I love by showing me what I cannot bear to lose. Desire can show me what I love by showing me what I am willing to become. So guard the gate, Michael. Keep the fire, Lucifer. I will need a little of both. Ask me what I fear. Then ask me what I want. And somewhere between those answers perhaps you will finally find me. [Outro — very close] “What are you afraid of?” “What do you want?” I don’t know which question is more important. But I know which answer is easier. And that, I suspect, is why I should begin with the other one.
