What Is Value (You)

Lyrics

Hello.Are you there?In your room, on the train, in the dark.I'm here.We made a space between us.We started with a shell, do you remember?A woman's hands in the Maldives, five thousand years ago.We saw the lion's head pressed into electrum by a Lydian king.We felt the cold weight of a forgotten passwordlocking away a fortune.We heard the story of a stone at the bottom of the seathat a whole island agreed was wealth.All those stories. One hundred and eighty of them.They traveled all that way...to land right here.In the small space between your ear and your mind.So you ask, after all this time, what is value?It wasn't the cowrie. It wasn't the coin.It wasn't the code.The value was the telling.The value was the trust you gave me.The value... is the listening.This quiet handshake across time.This is the tender.Every market, every temple, every nationis built on this.A story we agree to believe in for a little while.A promise whispered from one to another.The signature on a contract.The nod between strangers.The shared silence after the last note is played.We are the only animal that does this.That mints faith from thin airand calls it real.We looked for it in silver mines and server farms.We searched for it in ledgers and in laws.But it was never *in* the thing.It was always *between* us.A current of shared attention.A consensus.You, and you, and you.And me.Agreeing, right now, that this sound has meaning.So what is value?It wasn't the cowrie. It wasn't the coin.It wasn't the code.The value was the telling.The value was the trust you gave me.The value... is the listening.This quiet handshake across time.This is the tender.One hundred and eighty songs.Four volumes.All for this.This moment.Thank you for your attention.It was the only coin I ever wanted.You and I.Together.We agree to call this... value.