If it were love I wouldn't have
A second I could give away;
The seconds are for the players,
And these days, well, I hardly play.
If it were love I'd be confused.
I've gotten used to life, and, well,
To feel something bizarre and new?
I'm not sure I could really tell.
If it were love I'd stay in place.
No longer does my work demand
That I scamper around the world
To judge within a distant land.
If it were love it wouldn't be
Like anything I'd felt before.
And since I'm already complete,
It would somehow have to be more.
How could I split my mind apart
And give a smaller place to reason?
And how could any genius
So suddenly decide on treason?
Once time became my enemy
When everybody seemed to grow,
Compelled by something they could sense
But that I never seemed to know.
Not love—for love is all around,
My family's hands, in faith, in passion
For doing good, for doing well—
But bodies that pass out of fashion.
So there they are, with broken vows
And glories past, and scheming spies.
The deepest thinkers in the world
Are much like me: very unwise.
As strange as all my loves can seem
I will wholeheartedly deny
I'm stranger than that crowd, combined.
That bar is just not set that high.