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I fell out of love, that's our stories dull ending,
as flat as life is and as somber as the grave.
Excuse me, I'll break off the strings of this love song,
and smash my guitar, I have nothing to say.

Girl, sentimental girl, you'll surly go crazy,
running from one to the other like this.
To young to conceive of an ancient idea,
It's ended, and done with, it's over, finis.

Get sentimental and we end up by playing,
the old melodrama, "Salvation of Love".
"Forgiveness" we whisper and hope for an echo,
but nothing returns from the silence above.

You had better save love at the very beginning,
avoiding all passionate, "nevers and forevers".
We ought to have heard what broken hearts shouted,
"Do not make promises, promises are levers".

We should have made note of the broken branches,
we should have looked up at the smoking sky.
Warning the witless and forlorned parade of lovers,
"The greater the hope, the greater the lie".

Tru kindness in love means staying quite sober,
weighing each link of the chain you must bear.
Don't promise her heaven, suggest half-an-acre,
not unto death, but at least 'till next year.

And don't keep declaring "I love you, I love you",
that little phrase leads a durable life.
When repeated again in some loveless hereafter,
it can sting like a hornet or stab like a knife.

And so our little girl in all her confusion,
turns and returns from door to door.
I won't say, "forgive me" because I have left you,
I just ask your pardon for "I loved you before".

Smokey Lonesome / October,1968 / Charleston, South Carolina