The Sweetest Thing
“The Sweetest Thing” is a song whose origin escapes me. I remember humming it to myself wherever I went, walking to the grocery store, waiting for a bus, playing with the lyrics (as I usually do when writing a song), but I’ve lost the initial impulse. No matter: it’s the song that matters: and the song I have. The piano harmony is novel (it requires only 3 fingers)—and that moody photograph (far from being the sweetest thing) was taken more than a couple of decades earlier by Jeanne Dietsch (my second-oldest Chicago friend). One regret: my voice lacks the requisite resonance.
THE SWEETEST THING
Words and Music by Boman Desai ©
Living without loving is the saddest thing
Living without loving anyone
That’s not the way it was meant to be
Living without loving is the saddest thing
To be loved you only have to be loving
Living with a spouse can be the saddest thing
Living with a spouse who cares nothing
For the way you think or care or feel
Living with a spouse can be the saddest thing
To be loved you only have to be loving
Living without loving isn’t life at all
Even when it seems you’ve got it all
Cars, boats, gems, and mansions on the hill
Living without loving isn’t life at all
To be loved you only have to be loving
But loving everyone as if one were the world
And loving the world as if the world were one
Can be the sweetest thing
Can be the sweetest thing