Songfacts®:

• This synth-pop song finds Post Malone and SZA trading verses about the final throes of a doomed relationship.
  
  If you keep staring at the sun, you won't see
  What you have become, this can't be
  Everything you thought it was
  Blinded by the thought of us
  
  Post is warning SZA that she is in denial about the state of the relationship. In the same way that the sun can look beautiful, but staring at it is harmful, SZA doesn't want to admit to herself their relationship is damaging her.
• The metaphor of "staring at the sun" has been used for being blinded about the truth by several other artists, including U2, The Offspring and Jason Aldean.
• "Staring at the Sun" was a late addition to Hollywood's Bleeding after Post Malone decided that SZA would sound "awesome" on the song. He recalled on Kerwin Frost's Kerwin Frost Talks Youtube series, "We hit her up and she was like, 'I would love to do it.' She is so incredible and just such a sweet person, such a good person."
• This was Post and SZA's first collaboration together as the only two main artists. However, the pair had previously appeared alongside each other on the remix of Lorde's "Homemade Dynamite" with Khalid in 2017.