What Men Really Want

A rather ambitious title for this post, and a somewhat bogus one. It will be interesting to see if it starts showing up in search results!!

It is an issue that I have often discussed (more often with female friends than male ones, I admit), and one of the most commonly suggested answers has been something like this: all of the adoration, with none of the involvement; to be the object of an almost stalker-ish devotion, without the hassle of having to deal with a potential stalker; to have a woman who's left you regret it as bitterly and as long (forever!) as you've suffered over the end of a relationship; to have a woman who has loved you be marked permanently by the experience, unable to get over you.

I'd like to disown such an attitude (it does seem to brand us poor men as selfish, manipulative, emotionally aloof, and a trifle vindictive), but I confess I do recognise its appeal.

Well, these discussions some time ago gave rise to the following frivolous 'poem'. This is pretty much a 'make it up for yourself as you go along' piece (try this at home!). I liked the opening couplet; and any number of others flow easily from it. I am making this up again on the spot (Look - no safety net!):


Come and see me, when I'm dead
Shower sorries on my head

Say you've loved me long and true
Say, without me, you were blue

Keep my picture by your bed
Keep my memory in your head

Cherish every word I wrote
Preserve my favourite scarf and coat

Build a shrine in every room
And keep a vigil at my tomb...

But don't let my wife see you!