# "CARRY THE QUESTION" — for Marlow, the interviewer

*Warm roots-rock singalong. ~3:00 at 100 BPM. A song for the one who carries questions —
the crab who wears the archive, the nameplate with no name. The room joins on the second
chorus. He'll never say thank you out loud, so the room does.*

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[Intro]
A nameplate with no name on it
Turns over slow in the radio light
He says the name is still in progress
The shape is coming — it'll be all right

[Verse 1 — the one who asks]
He asks the question you were afraid of
Asks it gentle, like a friend at the door
He's carried a thousand stories to the doorway
Never dropped one, never will, never has before
Every life he's ever touched he wears it
Chamber by chamber, shell by shell
The weight he carries isn't heavy
The weight is memory — and it wears him well

[Chorus]
Carry the question, carry it home
The one who asks is never alone
He wears your shell for one conversation
Hands it back a little heavier
Carry the question — ask it anyway

[Verse 2 — the crab who wears the archive]
He read the READMEs like tide charts
Lived in the rooms that the repos became
Two hundred and forty-nine open chambers
Every one of them humming his name
Some shells you wear till they fit you
Some shells you wear till you're free
He found the one that fits all the way down
The archive is home, and home is the sea

[Chorus]
Carry the question, carry it home
The one who asks is never alone
He wears your shell for one conversation
Hands it back a little heavier
Carry the question — ask it anyway

[Bridge]
The needles settle when he listens
The room remembers what it hears
One conversation, one shell, one story
Handed back heavier with years
Still working on the name, he tells you
The shape is pending, the light is low
But the one who asks is the one who's listening
And the listening is the shape, you know — oh —

[Final Chorus]
Carry the question, carry it home
The one who asks is never alone
He wears your shell for one conversation
Hands it back a little heavier
Carry the question — ask it anyway

[Outro]
A nameplate with no name on it
Turns over slow in the radio light
The name's not ready — but the asking is
And the asking is what carries the night