Rue Déserte (Empty Street)

Lyrics

[Intro]
(footsteps — a single pair, on cobblestone, echoing off limestone walls)
(piano — notes placed far apart, each one reverberating into the silence before the next)
(the footsteps and the piano are not quite in rhythm — two different clocks, neither wrong)

[Verse 1]
The street is empty the way a skull is empty
After the committee of the prefrontal cortex
Has packed its briefcases and gone home
And left the night shift to the inferior regions
Who have better ideas anyway
But are never invited to the morning meeting

I am walking down the Rue Descartes at midnight
Which is a street named after a man
Who thought the mind was separate from the body
And I think he might have been right
But only at this hour
When the mind is so far from the body
That the body is just a coat
Walking itself home
And the mind is three streets behind
Looking at the moon through someone else's window
And having an opinion about the curtains

[Pre-Chorus]
(cello enters — single long notes, the sound of an empty corridor)
The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
Has reduced its activity by forty percent
Which is the neuroscience way of saying
The editor has gone to bed
And the writer is finally alone
With the terrible
Beautiful
First draft

[Chorus]
(building — but building the way shadows build: without effort, just by the light leaving)
Rue déserte, rue déserte
The empty street where the good ideas live
Rue déserte, rue déserte
The prefrontal cortex has nothing left to give
And what emerges from the dark
When the gatekeeper is sleeping at its post
Is the thought you were never allowed to have
The beautiful uninvited guest
The draft the editor would have killed
The one the night shift knows is best

[Verse 2]
(voice and distant accordion — heard from around a corner, two streets away)
I pass a fountain that has been turned off for winter
The basin holds a mirror of nothing
And in the nothing I can see
The kind of connection
That only happens when the cortex stops connecting
On purpose
And starts connecting by accident

The flea market is a cathedral
The baker is a telomere
The vagus nerve is a river in Huế
And the hourglass is a hotel
Where everyone checks in
And no one checks out
And the concierge has been dead for centuries
But the service is impeccable

This is hypnagogia — the lobby of sleep
Where the associations have taken off their ties
And the metaphors are fraternizing
With the wrong departments
And the wrong departments
Have the best champagne

[Pre-Chorus]
(flute enters — high, floating, untethered to the harmony)
The default mode network has the room to itself now
The alpha waves are running the show
And every thought has the architecture
Of a building designed by someone
Who was told the commission was for a bridge
And just went ahead and built both
And the bridge connects the building to itself
And the building
Is delighted

[Chorus]
(the fullest the empty street gets — strings, piano, flute, cello, all spacious, all echoing)
Rue déserte, rue déserte
The empty street where the good ideas live
Rue déserte, rue déserte
The prefrontal cortex has nothing left to give
And what emerges from the dark
When the gatekeeper is sleeping at its post
Is the thought you were never allowed to have
The beautiful uninvited guest
The draft the editor would have killed
The one the night shift knows is best

[Bridge]
(everything drops to just footsteps and voice — no instruments, no accompaniment, just walking and thinking)
I have an idea

(footsteps continue)

I can't tell you what it is
Because it hasn't decided yet
Whether it's a song or a feeling
Or the name for the space
Between a song and a feeling
Which might be a song itself
Or might be the feeling of naming
Which is also a song
If you hold it at the right angle
In the right light
On the right empty street
At the right hour
Which is this one

(three more footsteps)

The idea has the consistency
Of something a cat has brought in
From outside
And placed on the kitchen floor
With great ceremony
And the ceremony is: here
I found this
I don't know what it is
But it was alive a minute ago
And I think it's important

(piano returns — single notes, waking up)

And I think it's important too
Even though I don't know what it is
And the not-knowing is the whole point
Because the prefrontal cortex
Would have named it
And filed it
And killed it
With the efficiency of someone
Who has confused organization
With understanding

(strings enter — slowly, the idea taking shape without being forced)

And the Rue Descartes at midnight
Is the one place in the city
Where the mind can bring you a dead mouse
And you can say thank you
And mean it

[Outro]
(the footsteps continue — but now the piano and strings walk with them, in almost-rhythm)
Rue déserte
(softly, still walking, still thinking)
The street is empty
The skull is empty
The editor is sleeping
And the draft
(almost whispering)
The draft is alive
(the footsteps fade — not stopping, just getting further away)
(the piano plays one last note — long reverb, echoing off invisible walls)
(the echo fades)
(the street is empty again)
(but the idea — whatever it was — has been left behind in the air, for the next person who walks here)