it’s 2am and my brain calls a meeting about something i said in seventh grade
3 A.M.
Late Night Thoughts
for when the mind won’t rest
Read it in the room, by lamplighti’m not tired i’m just out of things to pretend about
the ceiling knows more about me than anyone i’ve dated
why is it that every thought i ignored all day waits for me to turn off the light
i rehearse conversations that will never happen and somehow still lose them
3am is the only time i’m honest and the only time nobody is listening
my body is in bed my mind is still at the party from saturday apologizing
i open the same four apps in a circle like one of them will finally have what i’m looking for
sleep is easy for people who don’t replay the way someone said ‘okay’
i’m fine during the day the night just doesn’t believe me
i turned my phone off so i’d stop checking and now i’m checking the phone that’s off
every night i promise i’ll sleep early every night i meet myself at 3am and we don’t talk about it
the house is quiet so my thoughts get louder to fill it
i wonder if anyone is awake right now thinking about me the way i’m thinking about everyone
i don’t overthink i just think and then keep going long after it stopped helping
it’s strange how the dark makes old things feel new and new things feel old
one more song i tell myself and then it’s four songs and a whole life i didn’t live
i’m awake doing the math on a life i’m not even living yet
the worst part about 3am is how convincing your feelings sound
i read my own texts from earlier like a stranger trying to figure out what i meant
some nights i’m lonely in a way no person could fix only morning
i lie here building a better version of today out of everything i didn’t do
why does every ‘what if’ come with its own soundtrack
at night i miss people i don’t even want back i just miss who i was around them
i keep thinking i’ll figure my life out tonight like it’s homework due at sunrise
the streetlight outside stays on all night i think we have that in common
i scroll until the faces stop meaning anything and then some more so i don’t have to see mine
i say goodnight to people and then stay awake with everything i didn’t say
at 4am every decision looks like the wrong one and every person looks like they’re leaving
i’m not sad exactly it’s more like my thoughts are sitting in the dark with their coats on
sometimes i stay up just to have a few hours where nobody needs me to be okay
the clock says 3:33 and i make a wish i’m too tired to believe in
i fall asleep mid-thought and wake up still in the middle of it
i keep my headphones in with nothing playing just so the silence feels like a choice
tonight i miss things that haven’t even ended yet
the night is long but at least it doesn’t ask how i am
i can survive a whole day of people but not one minute of my own head at midnight
i googled ‘is it normal’ and closed it before i could find out
overthinking is just caring with nowhere to put it
my friends think i sleep like everyone else i just know what the ceiling looks like at every hour
i’m scared of getting exactly what i want and finding out i’m still me
at night i become a detective of every ‘haha’ and every full stop
the moon doesn’t fix anything but it stays up with me and that counts
i keep the lamp on not because i’m scared of the dark but because the dark is where i keep you
i think my heart works the night shift
i lie awake making lists of things i’ll forget by morning that’s how i know they were never that important
somewhere between midnight and morning i stop being who everyone thinks i am
i whispered ‘it’s okay’ to myself and almost believed it which is more than yesterday
the night doesn’t make things worse it just turns off everything that was distracting me
go to sleep the thoughts will still be here in the morning smaller they’re always smaller in the morning