PERFECT HOSTESS

Everybody says she has a heart of gold

A true hostess in salon mould

Poised at centre stage and a picture there

Cool control and ruffled hair

If you should drop by at an evenings close

A final nip before the night’s repose

Her doors are always open

And her arms are always wide

So pay your dues, take off your coat

And step inside

 

Where there’ll be drinking and dancing and music that screams

In flickering clamour guests live out their dreams

And out of the gloaming with smiling finesse

At the eye of the storm

Shines the perfect hostess

 

People often say she’s lived a life apart

Emigree, broken heart

An actress for a time in a broadway show

But that was several years ago

Those who find a second home beneath her roof

Have heard the tales, but not the truth

They’ve not had time to ask her as she flits from arm to arm

Besides without a sense of mystery

Where’s her charm?

 

So she’s still meeting and greeting with consummate flair

An intimate smile shows she’s glad that you’re there

The patrons all fight for her natural noblesse

For whatever her past

She’s the perfect hostsess

 

People might be shocked to know how she’s bereft

Every night, once guests have left

For one who spends her evenings laughing time away

Life is strangely empty in the day

Clients who are tempted by her warmth of heart

Don’t know she’s put her life into her art

So clever at embracing she no longer feels a jot

Why she’s forgotten she looks happy

When she’s not

 

So nodding and waving she’ll hold out her hand

They’ll press it with fervour but won’t understand

She fears growing old for who’ll care to caress

The once beautiful form of an ageing host…

 

Meeting and greeting and kissing each cheek

The welcome is warm but the future looks bleak

Delighted to see her but blind to distress

Who cares what becomes of the perfect hostess?

 

 

Words & Music by Sue Casson

 

 Piano/vocals Casson  

 Violin Jacqueline Dennett

 

 

Recorded at Coachroad Studios

by David Oversby-Powell

 

Beachcomber is an ongoing project