L'Amour Qui Ne Se Dit Pas

Lyrics

[Intro]
(accordion — a love-song waltz with a smirk in the phrasing)
(finger snaps)

[Verse 1]
This is not a love song
This is a song about the way you buy two coffees
Without asking how I take mine
Because you memorised the order in October
And the memorising
Was the most romantic thing
That has ever happened
To a woman who does not believe in romance
But believes strongly
In the accurate delivery of oat milk

And the spare key
That appeared on my ring
Without a conversation
Just a key
And the key said everything
The mouth had been circling for three months
Like a plane cleared to land
But enjoying the view

[Chorus]
(full waltz — accordion, strings, warm, swinging)
L'amour qui ne se dit pas
The love that lives in the grocery list
L'amour qui ne se dit pas
The love that doesn't need to be kissed
To be believed
It needs the milk remembered
And the phone charged while you were sleeping
And the charging was so quiet
You didn't hear it
And the not-hearing was the whole point
Because the love that announces itself
Is performing
And the love that doesn't
Is architecture
And you are living in a building
Someone maintains
Without sending you the invoice

[Verse 2]
(stripped — voice and piano, the wrong cup)
This morning we both reached
For the same wrong cup
Yours is the blue — mine is the white
But the hands went wrong at the same time
And the laugh
Had more love in it
Than any balcony scene
Any airport run
Any rain-soaked bridge
The movies keep lying about

The bridge is beautiful
But the bridge is a performance
And the wrong cup is a Tuesday
And the Tuesday
Is where love lives

[Bridge]
(waltz slows — voice and accordion, the sincerity arriving)
I once loved someone on a bridge in the rain
And the love lasted exactly
As long as the weather

Now I love someone in a kitchen
With a thermostat set two degrees warmer
Than I would have set it myself
And the love has lasted longer
Than the bridge and the rain
And every movie that promised me
The bridge was the point

The bridge was never the point
The grocery list was the point
The spare key was the point
The two degrees
Was the whole entire point

[Outro]
(the waltz returns, the smirk and the sincerity holding hands)
L'amour qui ne se dit pas
(softly, no smirk now)
The coffee, the key, the cup
The two degrees
(a key turning in a lock — someone coming home)
(and not announcing it)