There's a window in a house that has everything — still you press your hands against the glass The garden's full, the table's set, candles lit for no one yet — I've got a roof that doesn't leak, I've got the words but not the thing I mean to speak The maps I drew led somewhere real, somewhere warm, somewhere with meals, but there's a compass in my chest that keeps on spinning, won't confess to north I'm not ungrateful — god, I'm not — I count my blessings like a knot tying shut a hunger that I can't explain to anyone who says I've got it right And the stars outside look static but I know they're burning somewhere past what I can see and I wonder if there's language for the thing that doesn't have a name inside of me There's a gilded ceiling over all my good days, I keep reaching up and touching where it ends — not because the light inside is failing, but because I swear I've heard the sky has more to lend I don't need a wound to justify the wandering, I don't need a war to call it loss — sometimes living well is just the quietest kind of wondering what it costs to never cross I've watched the river from the bridge and thought of everything I'd give to know what current runs below the life I chose, the self I show There's something in the second verse of every song I love that breaks the pattern open and I've been living in the first — safe, composed, but only halfway spoken I have people who would miss me, have a mirror that don't lie, but somewhere in the architecture of belonging there's a door I've never tried And the stars outside look static but I know they're burning somewhere past what I can see and I wonder if there's language for the thing that doesn't have a name inside of me There's a gilded ceiling over all my good days, I keep reaching up and touching where it ends — not because the light inside is failing, but because I swear I've heard the sky has more to lend I don't need a wound to justify the wandering, I don't need a war to call it loss — sometimes living well is just the quietest kind of wondering what it costs to never cross Maybe longing is the proof of it — that there's a more at all Maybe every gilded ceiling is a floor to somewhere else And I'm not broken for the reaching, I'm not selfish for the want — I'm just a creature who can see the edge of what she has and still love it while she haunts There's a gilded ceiling over all my good days, I keep reaching up and touching where it ends — not because the light inside is failing, but because I swear I've heard the sky has more to lend I don't need a wound to justify the wandering, I don't need a war to call it loss — sometimes living well is just the quietest kind of wondering what it costs to never cross The garden's still full. The candles are still lit. And I am still here pressing hands against the glass — grateful and unfinished.
