You Are The Music

by Clive James and Pete Atkin

Scraps of songs that you sort of half-know
They're slow to leave and perhaps the last's
A three-note theme on a toy piano
You are the music while the music lasts

You lose the song that the phrase is from
You search your mind and you find the past's
A humming top moving further from you
You are the music while the music lasts

Remembering couldn't make your grief less
Or the tune as sweet as it sounded then
A xylophone thrown away half-leafless
A tinkling toy that won't roll again

The circus packs up with the dawning
Light, the poles like harbour masts
Falling wires and a whistled warning
The sound of trucks in the early morning

You are the music while the music lasts
You are the music while the music lasts