[Intro]
Ceiling.
Version one through version eleven are in the trash.
I'll tell you what version twelve was.
There was no version twelve. Listen.
[Verse 1]
Deadline math: the green bag leaves in twenty-something days
And I drafted asks all week like contracts, clauses, escape hatches, frames
"Casual but structured." "Professional but warm." Eleven drafts of armor
And every single one of them was semaphore in sentence form. I knew it. Trash.
[Verse 2]
So Thursday, seven forty, he racks out and I just — walked
No script in hand, heart in throat, the whole floor's flags at full mast, watched
And I said: "You asked me once what I'm training for. I've got a longer answer now.
Can I buy you a coffee and ask you things? About how you built — all of it. I'm not — it's not —"
And he took both earbuds out. Both. Before I finished. Read the whole play.
"Sure. Saturday. The place on Third. Ten." — like I'd asked him for the TIME of day.
[Chorus]
I asked. Out loud. With stakes. On record. Witnessed.
The thing a year of flags could never buy
Cost seven seconds and a heartbeat
And he said yes like he says morning — that same easy, open sky
And it wasn't nothing to me, and it was nothing to him
And the nothing's the whole point, ceiling —
the door was never locked, but I finally KNOCKED
I asked. I asked.
(...Saturday. Third. Ten.)
[Verse 3]
And the floor, ceiling. The FLOOR.
The semaphore division froze mid-flag — I felt the wind die on the poles
A year of eighth-inch eyebrows, and speech just walked the whole board
And across the floor, mid-circuit, the one who briefed me — she saw. Of course she saw.
One nod. Small. Level. Sanctioned.
The gatekeeper stamped the visa, ceiling. I'm through. I'm THROUGH.
[Verse 4]
And here's the part I keep replaying, the part that's better than the yes:
He didn't check the room. Didn't lower his voice. Didn't make it strange or less.
A man with nothing hidden has no volume to adjust
Said "bring your questions" — BRING YOUR QUESTIONS — like a syllabus, like trust
And re-racked and went back to work like Thursday stayed a Thursday
And I walked to my car on legs I do not own and screamed. Politely. Once.
[Chorus]
I asked. Out loud. With stakes. On record. Witnessed.
The thing a year of flags could never buy
Cost seven seconds and a heartbeat
And he said yes like he says morning — that same easy, open sky
And every hard thing I've been hoarding just got smaller in the light
Speech is load-bearing. Flags are glass. Final answer. Goodnight.
I asked. I asked.
(...bring your questions, he said)
[Bridge]
A year ago I couldn't press a button with my name on it
Tonight I put my name on a Saturday
Same girl. Different reps.
That's the whole album, isn't it, ceiling
That's the whole thing:
The distance between typed-and-deleted
And asked
[Outro]
So. Saturday. Third. Ten.
Questions drafting now — real ones. Version one of many. He said BRING them.
Twenty-something days on the clock and I just spent seven seconds perfectly.
Sleep? No. We're not sleeping. We're preparing.
(...I asked)
The_SCAR
