The Love Song of a Twenty-Something

Let us go then, you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky like a Robert Smith lyric; let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, the muttering retreats of the Tenderloin, the Castro and Market Street. Oh, do not ask, "What is it?" Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go, talking of the new haircut on Billie Joe.

The fog is a cat, but there will be time, there will be time, for you and me. Oh let us eat our Big Macs in front of the TV.

In the room the women come and go, talking of where to score some blow.

And indeed there will be time to wonder "Do I dare?" and "Do I dare?" Time to wonder about Thurston Moore's hair. [They will say: "How his hair is growing long!"] I have my flannel shirt and my bluejeans torn, my T-shirt says "Green Day" and my face is full of scorn. In a minute there is time for BK TV.

I have measured out my life with music videos, and I know the names of the VJs by heart. So how should I presume to make a start?

The ‘rents’ eyes fix me in a formulated phrase and I have not seen my girlfriend, but that's okay. Then how should I begin to spit out all the roaches of my days and ways? And how should I presume to catch some rays?

So I know them already, know them all, as well as I know the noses pierced by little silver balls. So shall I get my news from Comedy Central or America Online? Or shall I go surf the Web from time to time?

I should have been a pair of ragged claws scuttling across William Gibson's floor.

And through the afternoon, the early evening, I sleep so peacefully! My parents ask no rent of me. Should I, after a microwaved burrito, have the strength to go to Sausalito?

And would it have been worth it, after all, after the crying, the complaining, the bitching, to go and fix my situation? What if she should say "That is not what I meant at all. That is not it, at all."

No! I am not Perry Farrell, nor was meant to be; am an attendant lord, one that will do, to attend a Lollapalooza or two.

I grow old ... I grow old ... I shall wear my leather biker jacket when it gets cold.

I have heard the Indian calling to each customer who purchases a cup. I do not think she will call to me, even though I stop to sup.

And I have slept on the tiles of a local shopping mall near rent-a-cops dressed in uniforms black and blue till Richard Linklater awakes me and says “Would you like to join my crew?”