The Decade of Myth didn't start
with the year six-oh
nor did it stop with the one
ending in six-nine
It started in sixty-three
with the death of Young John the Debaucher
and ended in seventy-four,
with Sir Dickie the Trickie's departure
we all got that straight? — solid, man!
I met the Fair Maiden Georgie Girl
on an Ivoryton Sixty-Nine summer night
my Boys of Summer campin' cross the lake
as were your hippie-chicks
Welfare and rich, mixin' & matchin'
in each other's sleeping bags
thirteen year old Elke Sommer's kid shackin'
up with the Gypsy Queen's daughter
so we figured why not us too
While my tongue was in your nethers
on that misty-meadowed night
and yours on my fair lance
I felt another on my foot
thought “How can she do that?”
I had to give a glance
In the heat of a passion
I look back and see
that a goat of the pastures
decided to make the scene
“Man, you know what yew got there, compadre?”
said old Ed the cook — “just one word, man
you'll understand, she goes to the same
school as Jackie O's kid!”
Your name was Georgette, your brother's Carroll
I should'a got the clue
but we talked not of backgrounds
we just wanted to screw
That mescalined night in the pond
skinny-dippin with three others
in front of the Ivoryton post office
doin' it in the road
an early train-spotting with cars
none came, we did
Man — we got two days off — where we gonna' go?
it's the weekend of a gig on Yasgur's Farm -
but we had not enough time for the show
Off instead to my poor man's heaven
on the other side of the LI Sound
meeting those children of god
all going the other way
Starry, Starry Night
we slept, talked and did the nasty
where I, in innocence once
built a raft of driftwood
to take me twenty miles across
to the shore from which we ferried
escaping my Father's demise
“Wake up! Wake up!”
roust the commie, preppie, philosopher, hippie and jock
I had one of each sort in my troop
Neil the Man's about to take his midnight walk!
we herded them into the mess tent to see
the moon violated by mankind's knee
Back in the City, you One East End Ave
me from across the Gowanus
riding the subway to the stars
wondering what I was doin'
your nanny plopped with a death thud
to the floor above us
in your private-elevator duplex
as we were loving in full window view
of the 59th Street Bridge — that wasn't groovy
You off to bucolic Pine Manor in Brookline
with your mama's Standard Oil money
me back to CCNY turmoil
in Harlem on my night cabbie's pay
visits on weekends, further apart -
we did start to grow away
One last stab — I your debutante escort
at your coming out debut
for the Grosvenor Ball in the Plaza
you were both loathe and loving to attend
four months after you first came with a man
or rather this boy from across the facts
Dine with a Kennedy here, a Lindsay there
under a blanket in a horse carraige ride
in Central Park, thereafter
you sneak into my room
for our last bedding
Remember back when we got kicked out
of that snooty Boston Common's hotel
for me refusing to wear a tie?
you laughed all the way with me
to the cheap shack up the block
Time driftwooded on, we left each other
my only contact with your world
became the green of the bluebloods
as I ferried them around the town
We met again in seventy-four on Mass Ave
just up from the Coop
me with my Nancy girl, you with
a Japanese artist, your Yoko
spurning your parent's wealth
he hair down to his calves
Maybe we had an effect on each other,
maybe the Sixties mattered
or maybe we were all just
Fools on the Hill
*
Ah - goes the world.
"That mescalined night in the pond
skinny-dippin with three others
in front of the Ivoryton post office
doin' it in the road
an early train-spotting with cars
none came, we did"
Where did the time go?
Good piece. *