After questioning the human race and its place on the globe on Pure Comedy, finding himself in a hotel on God’s Favorite Customer, and then maintaining two years of relative silence, Father John Misty returns with the compact and nearly serene “To S.” and “To R.” The songs are remarkably similar, like two glances at the same mirror, as Misty—a man known to be fond of a mirror metaphor—takes two tries at self-interrogation. Perhaps “To S.” is the image you see in the middle of an endless day of a never-ending week, and “To R.” is the first thing that confronts you the next morning, when you’re willing to ignore the lingering discontent and get back into the same rut.

On “To S.,” Misty is in the clouds, playing piano while lost in thought about someone’s tendency to disappear. Swept up by a gentle string arrangement, he skips the explication and submits to the vagaries of the human mind. “‘I had a dream and you were in it’/Is all you had to say,” he sings. He’s more exuberant on “To R.,” asking questions about love, beauty, and their fleeting nature while hoping a fortissimo piano performance will lead him to an answer. But whichever way you play it, you’ll still see the same mirror, with the same unknowns staring you in the face.