I am a man.
A man with nowhere to go in this world.
I eat. Read. Think. Sleep.
I see these things, these terrible things,
But there is not a single thing I can do about it.
There are no venues for prophets.
There is no margin for profit.
And we eat and sleep and read and think
And we don’t know a single thing to do about it.
There are cars.
Cars all over the place.
And babies and bicycles and unpublished manuscripts.
My friends. My colleagues.
Collegiate hopefuls that maybe
You will be the one who gets lucky on Gold Mountain
Instead of being some dead Chinese miner
Like me.
And I am a man.
But this is no consolation when you are sad.
Lost in your forty year work future
With nice THINGS everywhere that
You just can’t stand and
It’s hard to stand anymore when
You’re a man and life is hard.
Like me.
I understand.
I understand hope. I used to be hopeful once.
I said, when I have written a novel,
When I have 1000 poems,
When I’ve been published,
Surely no later than the age of 18,
I will have it made on Gold Mountain
(I think, at 21, with 1000 poems and 2 books)
Fighting with the guards
I rattle the bars
I’m not supposed to scream
Until I get my pass, as a trustee.
I am a man.
I have some problems, inside,
Hemorrhaging.
As I go through interrogation after interrogation
Of myself
For my work. For my art.
I am a man. It’s hard.
I am a poet. It’s hard.
I understand.
I will have it made on Gold Mountain.
But when, my friends? But when?
I am a man with nowhere to go in this world.
But up.
Buck up.
Tried coffee once or twice, Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
Living in a beatnik paradise. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.