American Rhapsody (3)
Before warmth and sight and sound are gone,
and sometime the evening lights spring up, as always, but not for you and not for me,
before the sky is lost, before the clouds are lost, before their slow, still shadows are lost from the hills,
Shall we meet at 8 o’clock and kiss and exclaim and arrange another meeting as though there were love,
pretend, even alone, we believe the things we say,
laugh along the boulevard as though there could be laughter,
make our plans and nourish hope, pretending, what is the truth, that we ourselves are fooled?
You can be a princess and I'll be the beggar; no, you can be the beggar, and I’ll be king;
