"The head does its best but the heart is the boss.
I admit it before I am halfway across."
In the poem, the narrator tries their best to convince themselves that they are not in love with the person they had lunch with. During this thought process, the narrator is walking across Waterloo Bridge in London. The bridge serves as a symbol for the time the narrator has to rationalize their romantic feelings away. While it is never explicitly stated why the narrator should not fall in love with that person, it is clear that these reasons are based on rationality. The narrator thinks it is a very bad idea, but still cannot stop the heart from falling in love.
In this quote, which comprises the last lines of the poem, the narrator finally gives up and acknowledges that no rational arguments can win over what the heart wants. And to further emphasize the inherent futility of trying to convince one’s heart with rational arguments the narrator has used only half of their implied time, by only being halfway across the bridge when they finally give up.
"I did all the jobs on my list
And enjoyed them and had some time over."
In the poem, the speaker has only recently discovered the joy that ordinary and trivial things bring them, such as an unusually large orange (the titular orange) that they encountered in their lunch break. It is never explicitly stated what the narrator does for work, or much about their life at all, but it is implied that their life is fairly simple. This is reflected in this quote as well. The narrator doesn’t specify what kind of jobs they are doing or names specific features that they liked. This implies that one can add “the jobs” (l. 10) to the list of trivial things that have just recently begun to bring the narrator joy.
And the fact that the narrator happily states to have finished early contradicts the joy they claim to have felt doing the jobs. Additionally, the narrator doesn’t say what they are doing with this unexpected free time. No hobbies, just emptiness. The quote is a very good example of the monotonous life the narrator is implied to be living, which is comprised on unspecific jobs and trivial, empty moments. And only the fact that the narrator has recently fallen in love (as revealed in the last line) suddenly turned their monotonous life into something they enjoy.
"We all have to be sensible sooner or later
But I refuse to be sensible all the time."
The quote is comprised of the last lines of the poem. In the poem a couple is sitting in a restaurant, talking about the possibility of switching to a healthier lifestyle, before eventually abandoning it. It becomes clear that the narrator sees a healthy lifestyle as non-compatible with having fun and enjoying life. They seem to see a healthy lifestyle as something mature and successful people do and appear to believe that eventually adopting a healthy lifestyle is inevitable.
However, the narrator isn’t ready to become this kind of person yet, which is revealed in the last line. The first two stanzas end with the narrator urging their partner not to be sensible all the time together, as if asking for permission or at least asking for an ally. The third (and final) stanza however, ends with the narrator exclaiming that they do not wish to be sensible all the time, regardless of what their partner chooses to do.
