All This Useless Beauty

It's at times such as this, she'd be tempted to spit If she wasn't so ladylike She imagines how she might have lived Back when legends and history collide So she looks to her prince, finding he's so charmingly Slumped at her side Those days are recalled on the gallery wall And she's waiting for passion or humor to strike What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty? All this useless beauty Good Friday arrived, the sky darkened on time Till he almost began to negotiate She held his head like a baby and said "it's okay if you cry" Now he wants her to dress as if you couldn't guess He desires to impress his associates But he's part ugly beast and Hellenic deceased So she finds that the mixture is hard to deny What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty? All this useless beauty She won't practice the looks from the great tragic books That were later disgraced to face celluloid It won't even make sense, but you can bet If she isn't a sweetheart or plaything or pet The film turns her into an unveiled threat Nonsense prevails, modesty fails Grace and virtue turn into stupidity While the calendar fades almost all barricades to a pale compromise And our leaders have feasts on the backsides of beasts They still think they're the gods of antiquity If something you missed didn't even exist It was just an ideal, is it such a surprise? What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty? All this useless beauty What shall we do, what shall we do with all this useless beauty? All this useless beauty --- All This Useless Beauty - Elvis Costello