As he milked the applause,
basking in the radiant glow
of a limelight that burned out some time ago,
to the dropping of jaws
his familiar slipped his side,
made her way to the wings
and stepped down from the ride.

He didn't know which way to turn
for she'd been with him from the start -
and in her absence his careful demeanour
and his well-structured schemes fell apart.

There's no comfort or safe haven to be found in the stormcloud night,
no friend for him now as he keeps holding tight to what might have been.

On another day he'd fix up his brave face so no-one knows
the depth of the chill that's set into his bones, but it's only here
that he knows for sure,
thinking not to question why,
all the milk of human kindness has run dry.

Nobody told him when the floodtide was coming then
it was suddenly over his head all too fast
and he was swimming for his life through the jetsam of his past
and all the driftwood of memory held in transitory, temporary measure,
none of that can buoy him up now in the bursting of his lungs,
in the blabbing of the tongue once so slick, once so proud.

Now he's counted out the time, he's fed out all the lines
that once charmed the birds from the trees...
You want jewels? He's got these,
empty words and empty deeds,
not much left of the man to see...