I'll Be Here -- A Villanelle

I'll be here when you need me, I promise that.
This is a statement solemn, you can trust it.
My door is always open and I'm available for a chat.

Though we were never lovers we are close for all of that,
I have loved you in a way that will not quit.
You suit the way my thinking works just like a well-worn hat.

You're made of the improbable, a modern Cheshire Cat
You can't be bent by others, not a bit.
You tongue comes out to razz the world, you act just like a brat.

When all the days of this life have gathered skirts and sat,
Then the tally of our dealings will permit,
A tale told of the telling blows we struck in our combat.

Yet I could cherish every word that you have ever "spat"
At me in anger, baffled, too timid to admit,
That you care for what I do, and what my actions have begat.

So here in our strange friendship, like players standing pat,
We wait for rival gents to fold and quit.
And find what confidence we need with what we can laugh at
As hostile time tries robbing us of the leavings in the vat.


Stuart Andrew Marshall Tanner