She Tried to Hold Me

She tried to hold me
She tried to hold me
She didn't know
Love is letting go

She said ‘I'm looking for perfection'
As she strode in my direction
She cast her mantle round me
Said ‘I'm completed since you found me'
She executed her enchantment
Secreted me in her encampment
With diversions and pretences
She dismantled my defences

She tried to hold me
She tried to hold me
She didn't know
Love is letting go

She told me I was unrealistic
And then she went ballistic
In her powder blue pajamas
Me some flotsam in her drama
She said “love's what I believe in”
But inside she was seething
With a cyclone raging under
Like she was skin surrounding thunder

She tried to hold me
She tried to hold me
She didn't know
Love is letting go

I made it to the stairwell
In the street I muttered farewell
With a driving wind again me
And shame exploding in me
It took me six years to begin again
To feel secure in my own skin again
For she lingered like uranium
Like a demon in my cranium

She tried to hold me
She tried to hold me
She didn't know
Love is letting go

All this was long ago now
And if I knew then what I know now
I'd have deployed a little patience
I'd have laughed at all her stipulations
But I was young and I fumbled
A boy-fool whose castle crumbled
I couldn't save her
Though I forgave her

She tried to hold me
She tried to hold me
She didn't know
Love is letting go