By mojave (mojave7299@yahoo.com)
Date: 17 March 2000

No Sad Lines Tonight

No sad lines tonight.
Gracias,
Senor Neruda,
but all that will come later. Reading or
writing them now
would be like trying to step
over the sidewinder
in the arroyo,
be like playing with matches
in the fireworks factory.
(And you, Senor,
knew a little something about fire!)
There are just
too many places 
to remember having been, too
many places still to be:
San Francisco in '92, late
nights in Tosca--
"A Guinness for Bukowski!"
"A Foster's for Corso!"
"A Dos Equis for--"
Wait!
At this rate we'll never make it to
Ginsberg,
least of all Kerouac (least of all 
standing up).
I am nowhere now
but where I must go--Glitter Gulch,
gran desierto...
Lessons?
I don't believe in them;
we never learn.
Best to be safe?
No, better to SIN.
Before you give it all to memory,
drink long and deep to not thirst again.