out this way

bay tides instigate vertical changes

accompanied by church organs,

announcing octopus multikey trumpet rides

up/down Grant Street’s endless grooves,

left turned slopes

this early morning nonchalantly yawns

as barroom stalls and all night pigeons clear out,

while Magictown city crews hose down Bay brokebrick alleyways

then later pass out free beers

yep, these redgold Ringling urbane hipsters

never hesitate, buzzin flies

wingin mint julip voices

meltin into another collective morning,

hummin manzanita redwood peasoup shanties

and when somebody’s last 4 bits go for last draft

later round midnight,

a stately beacon peers out over white pyramid buildings to the south,

and patrons posture bets over the City’s hall of fame hip sip runaround, psychedelic Ferris wheel,

once again fuelin back up,

once again a cycle begins again

and round another midnight Chinatown blocks away,

some members still be needin a mad companion for the SEE, baby,

to race round these syncopated sheer visionary streets

carrying a blighted butterknife for inspirational scrapings,

as this City’s all night bebop joints need constant paring, man,

require jollity in dueted harmonies

sung by lost sisters and brothers swapin solitary passages,

lonesome brief candles illuminatin

scopes of where we idiots really are:

“hey scribbler, which way’s the park jail where bums recite their circus visions? which way’s the wabbly 3-legged table scattered with beernuts and poesy and bits of cheap chipped wine glasses, which way’s the corner where disorderly patrons belch out tear jerkin Irish songs of gladness?”

SONG: then usher me through those washed-out seagreen doors

reelin straight into sweet rhapsodic wailins,

turn up the melted down jukebox furies,

come on, let us wantonly gait the sidewalk flutters,

heroically ride those endless City trains

boppin up down through insomniac baywashed City hills,

declarin all to imagine and swing:

this west goes no further tonight,

haults right here right now,

cause comes the next prophetic dream

to ride us along

just under the wire

NorthBeach, SF

8/15/73