if you juggle your scrumptious **** in my face
to sell your sound
i’m talking to you, beyonce
then you better open up when i come knocking
or i’ll take you to the better business bureau
you work for me,  i don’t work for you
however
the endgame of religion is transcendence
and since the holy books are bedtime stories
i’m talking to you, deuteronomy
if we get a lift to light from a **** superstar
as we aim for the great beyond – BEYONCE
if she’s our prayer, so be it
different compound, same chemical reaction
i’m talking to you, oxygen
you all work for me
or you don’t work at all

as the house of cards comes down…
if you can’t see that all the money in this country
is stored in the stingers of a small hive of queen bees
you’re not paying attention
quote me all the smug hard-hearted factoids
you can scrape off the radio
brand me tax-for-the-greater-good criminally naive
you might have a point, maybe there is no greater good
if it involves you and me together
i don’t know what i’d do to spread the gravy
resurrect leon trotsky?
but if you don’t think the rich have too much money
you’re a sucker

an arrogant conductor hires me for a show
it’s a cultural exchange, as we’re from different tribes
he gives me guitar music, a D chord with 4 staves
i ask him how he wants it played
"as it’s written!"
but the 4 bare slashes tell me nothing
it’s like working in a restaurant
and getting an order for chicken
"how you want this chicken?"
"follow the recipe!"
and the recipe is a picture of a chicken
so i cook it the way i like it
basted with latin flavor
oh, he’s ****** after the show
but the audience eats it up

exile is our fate
looking for a way home
even if we’ve never been home

exiled from my pulitzer
from my place at the algonquin roundtable
barred from the scotch of st. james 1966
john lennon’s holding my throne for me
but i can’t get in the club

exiled from our world conquests
our lives of leisure
exiled from the parents of our past
our children and ourselves as children
from the summertime of youth
and in the end
exiled from this ****** earth

being a poet is like being a king
but ******, it takes all my time
seducing the ladies
and corrupting the youth
it’s a full time job

if i can’t give a lunatic poem
to a lunatic lady
what’s the point of writing one?
well, maybe there is no point

i'm a curator of all that dissipates and evaporates
not only memories of my grandparents, my dad
now my mom
but the flesh tonsillectomy i performed on the rocks
in maine when i was 17
my wife's heartbreaking smile
and "come on down to my boat, baby"
a happy 60s tune no one remembers

one of the mellower insults of the aging process
is that things that were cool in your prime are utterly forgotten
if they’re pulled out of the attic everyone chuckles
and giggles at you for thinking you were cool to like them
even if they WERE cool and you WERE cool to like them

the popstar has his moment of success
and when it’s over, he doesn’t get it
he’s still the same musician
his latest tunes are as good as ever, maybe better
but for the audience, music is but one element
and not the most important
there’s the ambience of the era, the youth of the listener
the poignance, commotion and perfection of those years
that’s why the audience has a lifelong fondness for the performer
but little interest

i’m tired of my imaginary friend
he’s been loyal
always there for me
but can’t we be done?
i need my liberty
and i know he’s sick of me