The song of old lovers

Of course we’ve fought with angry faces:
For twenty years love’s mad at best.
A thousand times you’ve packed your cases,
A thousand times I’ve flown the nest.
Each chair and table still must smart
From war and thunderstorm and frost
That it’s endured from the beginning.
The whole is greater than the parts:
The taste for water you have lost
And me, I’ve lost the taste for winning.

Oh my love,
My sweet, my marvellous, my tender love,
From early dawn until day’s end, my love,
I love you still, you know, I love you.

I know your tricks and your deceptions,
You know my spells and wiles and charms.
From traps you’ve given me protection:
Sometimes I’ve lost you from my arms.
Sure we’ve had lovers in our beds:
It helped when there was time to kill
Or with our bodies’ passions raging,
But in the end when all is said
It seemed our only special skill
Was never growing up, just ageing.

Oh my love,
My sweet, my marvellous, my tender love,
From early dawn until day’s end, my love,
I love you still, you know, I love you.

And each succeeding year uncovers
More opportunities for hurt.
Of traps that lie in wait for lovers
This one’s the hardest to avert.
Of course you take more time to cry,
I take a lot more work to crack,
We get more devious and clever.
You can’t let chances pass you by,
You have to learn to watch your back:
The tender war goes on forever.

Oh my love,
My sweet, my marvellous, my tender love,
From early dawn until day’s end, my love,
I love you still, you know, I love you.