THE SMELL OF ADULTERY

THE SMELL OF ADULTERY

Each night he came home smelling,
Of perfume sweet and strong.
He couldn’t look me in the eyes,
I knew something was wrong.

I asked him if he’d found someone,
He laughed and shook his head.
One woman’s quite enough for me,
That’s what he always said.

One night around Halloween,
He came home smelling sweet.
I asked him where he’d been that night,
He shuffled both his feet.

I’ve been down to the graveyard,
There’s someone there, he said.
A woman called Victoria,
Who isn’t quite so dead.

Her eyes are green as emeralds,
Her lips are red as wine.
She wears a purple silken dress,
And says that she is mine.

She rises from her lonely grave,
Her perfume fills the air.
And when she comes to sit with me,
It clings to what I wear.

I said, you lying rascal,
You’ve kissed her, haven’t you?
He looked away and whispered,
I swear that it’s all true.

Then take me to this woman,
I want to see her face.
He led me through the graveyard,
To a dark and lonely place.

He touched Victoria’s headstone,
And whispered out her name.
She rose within a cloud of mist,
Her eyes like emerald flame.

I stamped my feet three times,
And raised my hands up high.
Victoria, I banish you,
Now vanish from my sight.

He cried, you’ve taken all my love,
My happiness and fun.
I said, you chose a ghost instead,
So now our love is done.

He longed to hold Victoria,
But knew she couldn’t leave.
He wouldn’t join her in the grave,
So all they had was grief.