Why Metaphysicians Make the Best Lovers

Lyrics

Examine with me the symposium speech of Aristophones.
Challenged poetically, we will not be brought to our knees.
Metaphysics, not poetics, can account for love’s desire,
And no tricks metaphoric can recount the lovely briar.

Round all over, two faces abreast, eight limbs awhirl,
That’s how our lovers, fused together, moved in the world.
‘Cause of their defiance, a godly alliance cut them in two
Now we desire, our halves to acquire, our love to renew

Can any sense be made of this want to be one?
Can an assist, from metaphysics, help our re-fusion?
Not if, perhaps, with democratus, we lapse into nihilism
For, then, no composites arise from the posits of the holy schism

Any two, not a paradoxic few, will form a set
And one they’ll be, platonically, even before they’ve met
Would love’s desire be fulfilled, in this other world so heavenly?
I think a union abstract would never impact love’s physicality.

Looking for a concrete alternative let’s consider two stream
Their waters intermingled, to form a single unaffixed theme.
Would such side-by-sideness, bring the kind of bliss of lover’s dream
Though it may feel beautifully, I think this unity is not suitably extreme

Perhaps one, a genuine one, is what our lovers would like to become
To lose their identity, to logical severity they will succumb
Perhaps we’ll agree, with Socrates, that love’s a kind of madne
But, our passionate, irrational fit hides a destructive sadne

Does our tragic vision rule out consummation of love’s desire?
Not if our world and words don’t match but merely conspire.
Certain anti-realisms about human persons will require paraphrase
Then we’ll resolve, or at least to dissolve, our inconsistent craze

That’s why metaphysicians, with their wisdom, make the best lover
‘Cause ultimately, they just don’t believe in each other.