Song 76: Healthy Philautia

Lyrics

[Intro]

[Verse 1]
The Greeks split self-love in two
The healthy kind and the hungry kind
And the language never recovered
From the confusion

Philautia — the good version
Is not the woman in the mirror saying I'm enough
While the mirror holds its reservations
It's the woman
Who made the soup
On a Tuesday night
For herself
With the good stock
Not the emergency stock
The stock she was saving
For company

And the company tonight
Is her
And she is worth
The good stock
And the fact that this
Is a revelation
At forty-three
Is the only tragedy in this song

[Pre-Chorus]
And the revelation
Didn't arrive with trumpets
It arrived with a bath
On a Thursday
When she was supposed to be
Somewhere else
And she chose the bath
And the bath
Chose her back

[Chorus]
Philautia, philautia
The love that fills the cup before it tries to pour
Philautia, philautia
Not selfish — structural
The way a foundation is not selfish
For being underneath the house
I am not the afterthought
Of my own life
I am the first appointment
On a schedule
I finally wrote
In ink

[Verse 2]
I used to skip meals
Not from disorder
From the particular efficiency
Of a woman who believed
Her hunger was less urgent
Than the next task on the list
And the list
Was written by someone
Who did not love her
And that someone
Was also her

The vagus nerve
Carries signals from the gut to the brain
Saying: you are hungry
You are tired
You are cold
And for twenty years
I treated those signals
Like spam
Unsubscribed from my own body
And wondered why
The inbox felt so empty

[Pre-Chorus]
And the resubscribing
Was not dramatic
It was a bowl of soup
And an early night
And the permission
To find both of those things
Thrilling
Which they were
Which they are
At any age
When you've been away from yourself
Long enough
To miss you

[Chorus]
Philautia, philautia
The love that fills the cup before it tries to pour
Philautia, philautia
Not selfish — structural
I am not the afterthought
Of my own life
I am the first appointment
Written in ink
Not pencil
Ink
Because pencil
Can be erased by the next person
Who needs something
And ink
Stays

[Bridge]
They will call you selfish
For sleeping eight hours
They will call you difficult
For saying no to the second favour
Before the first one was acknowledged
They will call you cold
For the bath on Thursday
When you were supposed to be
At the thing

And you will let them call you
Whatever they need to call you
And you will be warm
And full
And rested
And available
Tomorrow
When the cup has something in it
Worth pouring


Because the empty cup
At the crowded table
Helps no one
And the full cup
In the quiet room
Helps everyone
Eventually
Starting with the woman
Holding it

[Outro]
Philautia
The good stock
The locked door
The bath on Thursday