Is it all in that pretty little head of yours?
What goes on in that place in the dark?
Well I used to know a girl 
and I would have sworn 
that her name was Veronica
Well she used to have a carefree mind of her own 
and a delicate look in her eye
These days I'm afraid she's not even sure 
if her name is Veronica

Chorus

Do you suppose, that waiting hands on eyes,
Veronica has gone to hide?
And all the time she laughs at those 
who shout her name and steal her clothes
Veronica
Veronica

Did the days drag by? Did the favours wane?
Did he roam down the town all the time?
Will you wake from your dream, 
with a wolf at the door, 
reaching out for Veronica
Well it was all of sixty-five years ago
When the world was the street where you lived
And a young man sailed on a ship in the sea
With a picture of Veronica

On the Empress of India
And as she closed her eyes upon the world 
and picked upon the bones of last week's news
She spoke his name outloud again

(chorus)

Veronica sits in her favourite chair 
and she sits very quiet and still
And they call her a name that they never get right 
and if they don't then nobody else will
But she used to have a carefree mind of her own,
with devilish look in her eye
Saying "You can call me anything you like, 
but my name is Veronica"

(chorus)





Veronica





"It was sparked by going to see my grandmother 

the last few years of her life when she was rambling.  

And the times she  was happy or least distressed was 

when she was bouncing back and forward from the '30s to 

the '20s to the '50s.  Her conversation made no sense 

and I  thought, "Well, maybe that's all there is." 

I wanted it to be joyful-sounding, but with some 

sort of defiance.  Because there's a strange sort 

of defiance in  old people when they're physically 

pathetic. A strange way about them.  They'll suddenly 

look at you and they'll be looking right into you.

And then you look back and they won't be there at all.  

I think that's quite comforting." 





[Musicain Magazine, 1989]