AFTER TIME

(P. Assirati)

I wrote this song years before this recording. It owes a lot to a cafe off Tottenham Court Road in London.   I like those Squeeze songs that are like a condensed version of a play like 'Piccadilly', or Dylan's '4 th time around'. It's my attempt. The vocal ad libs at the end are many and varied but mainly from Astral Weeks as well as made up on the spot from our heads, that's me trying to be Joe Strummer - My hero.
 

We meet again in the same old place My heart's on the floor and her hair's in her face
I let her down but she came anyway
She was wrapped too tight, a vision on grey
And year after year
I peel away all the layers until I get through the fear


She sits down, (stairs) then she starts on a chain smoke
Shakes up her hair as she loosens her coat
"How are things on your side, how's it been at night?"
It's like she don't really care, she's just being polite
And time after time
Slow motion detail of how I went wrong every time

She turns to me, she'll swear and she'll say
"It wasn't meant to be this way"
But I've been here a year or maybe six
And still I don't know which way to kick
And time after time
The punishment feels much worse than the crime

We tried and we twisted, we bent 'til we broke
I hung on every word that she spoke
She tells me the truth and it hurts when it hits
She says "If something won't fix, break it all into bits"
And time after time
She says she's not going to stay so I...