Shelf Life - Lloyd Cole

I am consumed by delusions of grandeur

I’m fallen prey to the beautiful girl

I have seen romance in the obvious quarters

And I have painted myself into that world

I have constructed my own personal Babel

But many passages remain out of print

Leaving me in an unresolved sentence

Without an idea of where it went

I have developed an unnatural candour

In contradiction to all I hold dear

I think of myself as tall and silent

This little voice is all that I hear

Now the night’s drawing in

I’m your unworthy friend

At the untimely end of a lifetime

Thinking I might hold on to my first marriage

I learned the language of the self obsessed

It was only later at the post-grad parties

That it rewarded me with great success

No longer waiting for my prayers to be answered

No longer waiting for my publisher’s call

No longer charming in my reminiscence

Only immersed in a faint afterglow

Now the night’s drawing in

I’m your unworthy friend

At the ungodly end of a lifetime