Let us forget any sadness

together tonight

Pour me some wine

turn off the light

and look at the view from your balcony

London through your eyes

No one but you to keep me company

twenty floors up a high-rise

In a romance of the old school

if you lived in this tower block

you’d be a victim of the system

a subject for punk rock

But look at the view from your balcony

the sunset is searing the sky

and how proudly you are pointing out to me

London through your eyes

How like a prince in a castle

viewing dominions below

telling me now in a whisper

something I needed to know

And look at the view from your balcony

London through your eyes

No one but you to keep me company

twenty floors up a high-rise

1994. In the mid-nineties I had a boyfriend who lived in a council flat on the top floor of a block of flats in Bermondsey, which had a balcony with a magnificent view of the Thames and the City. The misery of living in tower blocks was (quite reasonably) a common subject for punk rock in the late seventies, but my friend had a completely different opinion of his.