A Better Way

Dear Vincent Is it true that you ate yellow paint So you could bleed sunshine instead of red heartbreak and pain Dear Vincent Is your story one hist'ry rewrote Did you let out your demons on canvas, so flowers could grow Would your paintings have been so amazing If you had been saner? Did your sadness unlock the holy in something so plain as one pale face Was a brush Just enough To get you through when times were tough Would you trade the starry night for day Is there a better way Dear Amy The blackness got you in the end Did you think you had beat it before it got you back again Dear Joni Did you blister your fingers from playing guitar Preaching that melancholy ought to live close to the heart Would we still sing those tunes if you hadn't been quite so blue Was that your secret, were you inspired by the sadness in you Were you wrong All along Is there pain left unfixed by a song Are all great ones a bandage for pain Or is there a better way Dear Virginia Were you only sane as you wrote At the end of the book, was there nothing to keep you afloat Dear Sylvia Did you find beauty in those torturous thoughts Did your poetry free you or were you just caught in the storm Did you think that the world would find truth in your journals Or were they never meant to Do you only become art when somebody really sees you Did each verse Make it worse Was your eloquence really a curse That's your burden, even today Is there a better way There's a monster living in you like is living in me Does he take your vision away or does he help you to see Am I doomed to this fate The recluse who holds hate In their heart And the hate makes the art Must I cling to this pain So I've something to say What will it be Will I beat this or will it beat me Dear Vincent What would you tell me today Would I have to choose either way Joy never made something great But sadness is heavy and I can't hold this weight What did you do on those days Did you paint The ivory knows And the ivory cares And the ivory listens More than they'd ever dare But the things in my head My fingers can't play Is there a better way