(In case you know, don't mean to patronise. 'Strangeways' is another name for Manchester Prison')
This love is conducted long-distance
While you're next to me.
We're talking via fuzzy phone
And separated by barely visible glass.
I go 'mmmm?' when you talk,
Although your voice is loud;
I'm somewhere else.
There's criminally furious love
Just feet away,
Behind a coronary wall.
It paces with regular feet
Plotting escape in acts
Of tenderness
But still...still I can't
Leave this Strangeways of the Heart.
No files in cakes or
Spooned-out tunnels
Will bring me out.
The Warden's strict regime -
The dullness of routine -
Wants to break my man,
This healthy, throbbing
Certainty that you are everything.
Some day, when you visit,
Peering through the bars of chores
You'll catch me waiting
Behind these eyes,
And you will throw aside
Responsibility and ironing
And in that day, tried and tested,
You'll do time with me
Happy never to be free
In here, this Strangeways of our Hearts.
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