rolled a joint on Friday night

rolled a joint on Friday night

it was so scary it gave me a terrible fright

like at a Halloween party with a circus clown

dipping for a bobbing Adams apple and i almost drowned

thinking of the weekend and the local rodeo

singing cowboy songs for the country radio

station and all the girls looking for a wild time in the saddle

playing table tennis with a hard wooden paddle

bouncing that little white ball over the sagging net

and i'd gladly take whatever score i could get

but it was Christmas time without a foot of snow

so naturally i had no idea which way to go

when the ballroom door swung open with a rush of cold air

and Cinderella was the prettiest princess i saw standing there

in a slim rainbow dress and wearing shiny glass shoes

she was the spitting image of a bottle of booze

i was like a meek mouse with nothing to lose

said to her i'd like to be her driver before midnight

but now thinking in hindsight

that was a silly thing to propose

or so i suppose

'cause i read the book and knew the ending was fine

and my editor kept reminding me of a deadly deadline

which i completely forgot about

but when the clock stuck twelve i could hear her shout.

with most of the pieces missing

it was on Tu Do street

where i went to meet

someone who i didn't know

for a simple bite to eat

it was long after first light

but before Friday's Follies

and i'm listening to the Hollies

Long Cool Woman In a Black Dress

with too many questions unanswered

so i could only guess

when she would eventually stop to rest

to take my pulse or steal my heart

but i never got her name and we would shortly part

she staying east and i flying west

no more than a temporary visitor and destructive guest

failing every morality test

digging the tunnel where a white rabbit

sat shooting up with a destructive habit

some roads heading north or south

i felt the blood in my mouth

read newspapers which told of savage indifference

and it suddenly made no sense

standing on the wrong side of the fence

but there were shooting stars and the moon kept spinning

even when the losers claimed they were the ones' winning

and i thought i remembered her name

but it was only a memory from an old board game

with most of the pieces missing:

it's only shadows now that i'm kissing.

at the intersection of five and dime

hey Lou

what was that sound?

is it you digging deeper underground

looking for an exciting place to go

but you still don't know,

as you've said many times in your song,

trying to understand where you went wrong

on a dirty New York City street

moments before we were supposed to meet

at the intersection of five and dime:

maybe you'll come around some other time

drifting inside your mind like softly falling snow

looking for an exciting place to go

maybe Paris on the famous left bank

sailing your vanilla vessel before it sank

and you'll have no one left to thank

wishing you were born a long time ago

looking for an exciting place to go

maybe with a poison spike in your hand

dripping blood onto a beach of white washed sand

playing electric guitar with a massive echo

listening to the haunting voice of beautiful Nico

blonde and slim and dark-eyed

I heard you broke-down and cried

looking for an exciting place to go

as you've said many times in your song,

trying to understand where you went wrong

on a dirty New York City street

moments before we were supposed to meet

at the intersection of five and dime:

maybe you'll come around some other time

drifting inside your mind like softly falling snow

looking for an exciting place to go

but you still don't know.

Pascin's Funeral Day: June 7, 1930

at 36 boulevard de Clichy, 
the walls of his studio were sticky red
with an explosion of ultimate sadness 
when he drew a final kiss for his mistress, 
and drew a final breath
for himself.
on the day of his funeral, she dressed in black.

his wife in black.
waiters and bartenders in black.

saloons in black.

black was the cloud and black was Paris.

those streets, preoccupied with their special mourning, 
allowed only the walkers to follow behind his coffin
to a simple grave site.

their shoes were black. 

their grief was black.

but there, the turned Earth was a fertile brown.  

the near grass brilliant green.

the sky a Matisse blue.  

colorful birds sang and flew 

into the air, a sweetly poetic painted still life. 

windows were flung open.
fragrant wine was poured into buckets of remembrance,
where thoughts like flights of gaiety lifted and blew away as tiny bubbles.
later, his family moved his body to Cimetiere de Montparnasse,
where today he still turns inside that hole.

the sly head of Apollinaire

after the exploding shells

targeting the trenches

of the western front,

a shrapnel wound

wrapped by a large bandage 

walked a side street of Paris,

retreating with a handheld bouquet of field poppies,

watching horses making their early rounds,

gaining insight into the educated mind of

modern man.

it was the sly head of Apollinaire,

crafting written lines like a fisherman casting bait

before the hungry eyes of curious fish,

remembering the recent war,

dabbling in the moods of philosophy.

an Italian by birth,

he kissed the French battleground 

with a faint cubist mouth,

licking his wound with a deep introspection.

in his Paris scene, the wooden entrance doors,

opening and closing at all hours,

were painted in different colors,

but he always knew which were the more expensive,

accurately guessing prices with a practiced eye.

what seemed unimportant, he knew otherwise.

and his friends knew where to knock and when to embrace,

and how to count the cost

of remaining silent.

they were artists and poetic lovers and

he loved them all in still life and 

when candle flames went dancing across skin,

creating the world that he saw,

and the one he imagined.

he lived in both.

when he died, a myth was born along

with the man.

the door colors have now faded.

his poems remain eternal.