Peter Hammill - Famous Last Words

"If I close my eyes I can pretend
The best is still before me, the worst is at an end.
Time for goodbyes to the audiences that adored me;
They never realised
Just how much I came to despise all their eagerness."

Famous last words,
Made in jest, overheard,
Is that your best testament?
Or are you coining a phrase
Just to see how it plays
When you're at your wits' end.
Famous last words,
To the last you'll self-serve,
What a waste of your breath.

When you close your eyes will you pretend
That nothing bad has happened, that we are still close friends?
So many lies, after all the illusions are shattered
Still at all costs you must hide
The emptiness where your true feelings used to reside.

Famous last words,
They're so over-rehearsed -
They just sound like pretence.
You'll go out in style,
To the last in denial
Of what anything's meant.
Famous last words,
To the last you'll self-serve,
What a waste of all that breath.

(It's a little too late for sorry...
In a race against the clock
Now you hit that mental block
Time to take that poison cup
Now your time is all used up.)