who'd've known at this party that
I would walk in and I'd see you
I guess now I could just get drunk
yeah, and that could be our excuse
you could slip from out of nowhere
I could be there to catch your fall
we could laugh at ourselves
and the writing that's on the wall
it's a narrow margin
just room enough for a grip
in the inch and a half between
"hey, how've you been?" and "can I kiss you yet?"
so we talk, like nervous neighbors
over a tall fence
true love, but for the lack of
Providence...
and I've just got one more thing to tell you
'cause words are vitamins and life is short
and I know when we get up to the front office
we're gonna have to fill out a full report
and the first question will be, "what were you thinking?"
the next question will be, "what did you say?"
then they're gonna check to see if the answers to one and two
matched up much along the way
in the interests of poetry
and the cowboy movie that's you and me
I'm back on the horse now, and I'm riding it
I am striding so effortlessly
what I mean is, it's late, much too late for us
and I'm fixing to go home
with just my conscience, and a bitter sense
of irony as my chaperone
it's a narrow margin
just room enough for a grip
in the inch and a half between
"hey, how've you been?" and "can I kiss you yet?"
so we talk, like nervous neighbors
over a tall fence
true love, but for the lack of
Providence...
a cold and porcelain lonely
in an old new york hotel
a stranger to a city
that she used to know so well
bathing in a bathroom
that is bathed in the first blue light
of the beginning of a century
at the end of an endless night
then she is wet behind the ears and wafting down the avenue
pre-rush hour, post-rain shower
stillness seeping upwards like steam
from another molten sewer
summer in new york
they've been spraying us with chemicals in our sleep
us / they
something about the mosquitoes having some kind of disease
them / me
CIA foul play
if you ask the guy selling hair dryers out of a gym bag
chemical warfare
"I'm telling you, lab rat to lab rat," he says, "that's where the truth is at"
and everything seems to have gone terribly wrong that can
but one breath at a time is an acceptable plan
she tells herself, and the air is still there
and this morning it's even breathable
and for a second the relief is unbelievable
and she's a heavy sack of flour sifted
her burden lifted
she's full of clean wind for one lean moment
and then she's trapped again, reverted
caged and contorted with no way to get free
and she's getting plenty of little kisses
but nobody's slippin' her the key
her whole life is a long list of what ifs
and she doesn't even know where to begin
and the pageantry of suffering therein rivals television
tv is, after all, the modern day roman coliseum
human devastation as mass entertainment
and now millions sit jeering, collectively cheering
the bloodthirsty hierarchy of the patriarchal arrangement
she is hailing a cab
she is sailing down the avenue
she's 19 going on 30
or maybe she's really 30 now ...
it's hard to say
it's hard to keep up with time once it's on its way
and, you know, she never had much of a chance
born into a family built like an avalanche
and somewhere in the 80s between the oat bran and the ozone
she started to figure out things like why
one eye pointed upwards looking for the holes in the sky
one eye on the little flashing red light
a picasso face twisted and listing down the canvas
of the end of an endless night
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
and kerplooey
you're done.
you're done for.
you're done for good.
so tell me
did you?
did you do
did you do all you could ?
