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I learned the truth at seventeen_ That love was meant for beauty queens |
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And high school girls with clear skinned smiles who married young and then retired |
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The valentines I never knew, the friday nights, charades of youth |
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Were spent on one more beautiful_ At seventeen I learned the truth |
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And those of us with ravaged faces, lacking in the social graces |
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Desp'ratly re[mained at home inventing lovers on the phone |
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Who called and say "come dance with me" and murmured vague obscenities |
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It isn't all it seems at seventeen |
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A brown eyed girl in hand-me-downs, whose name I never could pronounce said |
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"Pity, please, the ones who serve, they only get what they deserve. |
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The rich relationed home-town queen marries into what she needs |
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A guarantee of company and haven for the elderly" |
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Remember those who win the game, lose the love they sought to gain |
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In debentures of quality and dubious integrity_ |
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Their small town eyes will gape at you in dull surprise when payment due |
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Exceeds accounts received at seventeen |
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To those of us who know the pain of valentines that never came, |
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And those whose name were never called when choosing side at basketball |
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It was long ago and far away_ The world was younger than today |
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And dreams were all they gave for free to ugly duckling girls like me |
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We all play the game and when we dare to cheat ourselves at solitaire |
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Inventing lovers on the phone, repenting other lives unknown |
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That call and say "Come dance with me", and murmur vague obscenities |
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At ugly girls like me, at seventeen |
