Kiss-Kiss Boom-Boom

Loving and laughing are nothing but tricks –
Just social conventions we do for the kicks.
We desp’rately want to be one of the crowd,
And if we suspect, then we do them too loud.
We’re unsure and frightened, we’re playing our parts –
We want to believe, but we know in our hearts…
We know that biology’s running this gaff,
And it needs us to love, and it needs us to laugh…
So sod it, who cares if it’s all in the head ?,
We’re gullible fools who are easily led.
If love is elusive, it don’t mean it’s broke –
For even the cynical like a good joke.

Twenty-Twenty Hindsight

Twenty-Twenty – what a blast,
The year when the planets kissed !
We were so young and life so vast,
With not a moment missed.
We met by chance, we met online,
When hiding from the flu –
That year I tippled too much wine
And fell in love with you.

Twenty-Twenty – let it sing,
The year we sang our tryst !
The swallows came upon the Spring,
And you had taught me whist.
From kitchen top or garden bench,
Our screens would share the view,
That year I learned to speak in French
And fell in love with you.

I know, I know, we were the lucky ones,
Laughing along with the doomsayers’ chimes –
We weren’t the heroes, we were the stuck-at-homes,
Making the best of the worst of times.
But when I look back on that strange, strange trip,
I’m glad that we saw it through –
If I ever must face the Apocalypse,
Then the end is much better with you.

Twenty-Twenty – our world shook
In the year when we must not move –
I tried and failed to write a book,
And saw my cakes improve.
I spent all day upon the phone,
And watched how the garden grew –
In the year that my neighbour learned trombone,
And I fell in love with you.

I know, I know, we were the silly ones,
Giggling our way through the horror of it all.
I know that we felt it, just like the millions,
But those aren’t the memories we choose to recall.
I’m glad that we lived with that strange, strange fate,
When the world was surreal and new –
If I ever must wait such a lonely wait,
Then the lonely’s much better with you.

Running for Office

That first date, you never told me
How afraid you are of moths,
Nor ever interrupted me
To lean across the tablecloth
And gently touch my knuckles like you do
(But didn’t do that night)
To carefully explain how you
Must always sleep upon the right.

You never said how many times
You have to check you have your keys –
Between the starter and the main
You somehow managed not to sneeze,
And while you kept me giggling with your jokes,
You wholly overlooked
To mention just how zealously
You like your pasta undercooked.

You didn’t squeak a pip about
Your overfondness over wine,
That keeps you too afraid to drink.
You didn’t think to spin a line
Of how you’d always rather lie
Than have an argument.
Or how you never understand
Just how your paperbacks get bent.

I guess I’m glad you never told me
What was lying there in wait –
For had I known, I doubt if I’d have
Ever risked a second date.
But when I think of who was sat across the table,
On display –
If that were all you were,
I think we wouldn’t still be here today.