Cortisol Dirtbag

Lyrics

[Intro]
Hey, cortisol, you old dirtbag.
Slipping through my veins since that winter in Montreal, 1936.

[Verse 1]
I see you in Hans Selye's notebook,
frantic scribbles on yellowed pages,
that chilled lab at McGill, 10 degrees Celsius,
3 AM under dim light.
You were born there, weren't you?
From stressed rats and dropped syringes,
that sharp tang of formaldehyde still clings to you.

[Chorus]
Cortisol dirtbag, double-edged sword,
Bruce McEwen called you out in '99,
Rockefeller's sterile suite, MRI humming at 22 degrees.
You help me adapt, then scar my hippocampus,
chronically high, making me a little older each time.

[Verse 2]
You're the indelible scar Selye spoke of,
in his 'Stress of Life' from 1956.
I feel you in my morning peak, 10 AM rush,
stale coffee taste on my tongue,
that beat-up Ford Model A hauling your secrets through snow.

[Bridge]
You're no friend, just a gritty survivor,
allostatic load weighing down my prefrontal cortex.
But I pay for every fight-or-flight,
with your silent havoc in my brain.

[Verse 3]
In the neuroimaging suite, late '90s New York,
subjects lying still, feeling your cold grip.
You leak like sand from a cracked hourglass,
fluid time in my polyvagal dreams.
Hans accidentally found you mishandling rats,
now you're my constant companion.

[Chorus]
Cortisol dirtbag, double-edged sword,
Bruce McEwen called you out in '99,
Rockefeller's sterile suite, MRI humming at 22 degrees.
You help me adapt, then scar my hippocampus,
chronically high, making me a little older each time.

[Outro]
Hey, cortisol, you old dirtbag.
I'll rewrite your script, one breath at a time.
From Selye's lab to my gilded synapse.