Song 13 of 20
Song 13 of 20
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Treatment and medical appointments have become part of their life. The husband increasingly watches his wife for signs of exhaustion and begins trying to protect her from things he thinks may be too difficult. She notices the change in the way he looks at her and pushes back. She still wants affection, humor, choice, intimacy and the ordinary relationship they had before the diagnosis entered the room.
I push my chair and start to riseYou spring so fast, I roll my eyes“Want anything while I’m up, love?”You move my purse, then lift my cupThe look that stops you where you standYou set my cup back in my handHelp when I ask; let me decideI know just what I feel inside
You search my face for what you fearAnd miss the woman who stands here
I’m still here, all of me, with youThese hands still know what they can doDon’t touch me like I’m made of glassMy skin still answers when you passBe scared, but stay where I can seeI’m still here; come be here with me
You call the kids to cancel plansI take the phone out of your hands“At seven sharp. Please save our place.”I paint my lips, then show my faceThe waiter asks; I choose the spiceThen steal your olives once or twiceI guide your hand back to my waist“Now that,” I say, “is more my taste.”
When you count every breath I takeYou miss the choice that’s mine to make
I’m still here, all of me, with youThese hands still know what they can doDon’t touch me like I’m made of glassMy skin still answers when you passBe scared, but stay where I can seeI’m still here; come be here with me
That fear beneath your tender careFinds me as well; I feel it thereAt three a.m., the room feels wideI reach to find you at my sideI do not know what waits aheadSome nights it settles in our bed
Be scared right here, skin close to meI need your touch, not sympathy
We’re still here, wholly here, we twoWith room for fear and laughter tooWe’re flesh and fire, not made of glassMy skin still answers when you passWe cannot know what time will doBut I am here, and so are you
I pull you close and dim the lightWe leave the plates and cups tonight
You search my face for what you fearAnd miss the woman who stands here
I’m still here, all of me, with youThese hands still know what they can doDon’t touch me like I’m made of glassMy skin still answers when you passBe scared, but stay where I can seeI’m still here; come be here with me
You call the kids to cancel plansI take the phone out of your hands“At seven sharp. Please save our place.”I paint my lips, then show my faceThe waiter asks; I choose the spiceThen steal your olives once or twiceI guide your hand back to my waist“Now that,” I say, “is more my taste.”
When you count every breath I takeYou miss the choice that’s mine to make
I’m still here, all of me, with youThese hands still know what they can doDon’t touch me like I’m made of glassMy skin still answers when you passBe scared, but stay where I can seeI’m still here; come be here with me
That fear beneath your tender careFinds me as well; I feel it thereAt three a.m., the room feels wideI reach to find you at my sideI do not know what waits aheadSome nights it settles in our bed
Be scared right here, skin close to meI need your touch, not sympathy
We’re still here, wholly here, we twoWith room for fear and laughter tooWe’re flesh and fire, not made of glassMy skin still answers when you passWe cannot know what time will doBut I am here, and so are you
I pull you close and dim the lightWe leave the plates and cups tonight
Behind The Song
Behind The Song
Still Flesh And Fire returns the story to the wife herself.
Once serious illness enters a relationship, fear can quietly alter the way other people see the sick person. They become fragile. A diagnosis begins replacing a name. Decisions are taken out of their hands in the language of protection.
This song refuses that reduction.
The wife does not deny the illness.
She is afraid too.
But illness has not erased her mind, her sexuality, her humor, her preferences, her authority over her own life or her ability to decide whether she wants to stand up and get her own cup.
She is not merely the woman her husband may lose.
She is the woman who is here.
That gives the song one of the album's deepest instructions:
Do not leave someone emotionally before they are physically gone.
Anticipatory grief is understandable. Loving someone makes the possibility of losing them frightening. But fear can become so future-focused that it begins stealing the present from both people.
Her response is not motivational optimism.
She does not promise recovery.
She says, essentially: Be scared. But be scared here. With me.
The body's role is also crucial. Romantic love has always been physical in this album. Illness does not automatically make the body nonsexual or transform a lover into an object of sympathy. She still wants touch that recognizes the woman rather than delicately handling a patient.
Dignity here means personhood. Choice. Desire.
The right to remain recognizably oneself inside changed circumstances.
The future may be uncertain. But this meal is happening. This joke is happening.
This hand is warm. This woman is alive.
The Takeaway
The Takeaway
A diagnosis identifies something happening to a person; it does not become the meaning of that person. To love someone through illness is to hold two truths without sacrificing either: reality has changed, and the living individual before you still possesses agency, humor, sexuality, preference, dignity and desire. Do not let tomorrow's possible absence become more real than today's actual presence.
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