Here in the funhouse

Here in the funhouse, boys and girls avoid the malignant trapdoors, obey anticipatory warnings; be aware of hidden, spiky mines, floating on lines, under the deep and dark blue sea. I loved you, and you liked that, but the gap between like and love is a river without a bridge: nothing, nothing at all can get you across. You knew, yet now this blank silence, consciously intended, is killing me. Well, it's a hard and cruel way to reject a lover, never mind if you actually dislike him; it's such a passive and easy way out -- so very cold. Women have hurt and bruised me so many times: well, never mind, I have done the same, I expect, along with a failure to show respect: I am so sorry, sometimes. It's only now I begin to understand. I have lived with not a few and made love with many more, but, surely, that is not the point. They used to be looking at me and I used to be looking at them as well and the electricity was crack-crack-crack. But that's all gone. Women's eyes pass over me now. They couldn't be bothered. But here is me still looking. I like most women -- and my attention, my intention is admiring, relaxed and cool. I have never been a fool. Compliments, smiles, a dance, the beginnings of a new romance, are infinitely more important than Wars and Governments and Kings: real life consists of simple things.