written by Billy Strayhorn   © 1949 Tempo Music (ASCAP)      I used to visit all the very gay places   Those come what may places   Where one relaxes on the axis of the wheel of life   To get the feel of life from jazz and cocktails      The girls I knew had sad and sullen grey faces   With distingue traces   That used to be there you could see where they'd been washed away   By too many through the day twelve o'clock tales      Then you came along with your siren song   To tempt me to madness   I thought for a while that your poignant smile   Was tinged with the sadness of a great love for me   Ah yes I was wrong, again I was wrong      Life is lonely again   And only last year everything seemed so sure   Now life is awful again   A trough full of hearts could only be a bore   A week in Paris could ease the bite of it   All I care is to smile in spite of it      I'll forget you, I will   While yet you are still burning inside my brain   Romance is mush, stifling those who strive   So I'll live a lush life in some small dive   And there I'll be   While I rot   With the rest of those whose lives are lonely too