
I learned to drift...magik...taroc pack
I paraded in thirty disguises
and when people laughed at my carnival family
We didn't care...We had amour:
Daddy was a tap dancer...acrobat...wild horse
tracing pornography through the bible.
Mama was the dream of every sailor...bootlegged whiskey
called spirits from the evenings half moon...dream weaver
We braved hurricanes...a new baby came...I named her Kim
the neighbors were suspicious...they called us witches
we didn't care...we were laughing and dancing and damned
and there was always music
Hank Williams crying off the lonesomes
funny valentine...Patty Waters
beat of the drum...bartok
song of the swamp rat
rock and roll music
rock and roll music
Rythum
On my own...my own rythums:
rythum of the railroad
steamheat of the factory
Alabama blues on a migrant bus
but as a blueberry picker I failed...I dreamed too much
the berry crop died...my mother smiled.
I ran off...I traveled...I broke down
kept running...TB trapped in the lung...spitting on the railroad track
I shook...I drank...rythum of one too many rhums
Drunk and broke down I slinked home...grabbed my sisters hand
and away we run...we took a frighter to Iceland
railway to Paris...Pigalle and wine in a black dress
I joined the fire eaters and sang in the streets...using all I learned
from Lotte Lenya...Bob Dylan...and motorcycle rock n'roll
We lived near a wishing well...milked goats...capyured snails
and crawled back to New York.
New York my greatest love:
Rise of the building
flash of 42nd street...the pool halls...the hustlers
the trucks along tenth avenue
the helicopter yards
ghost of Jackson Pollock
human shit and dead dog floating on the Hudson River
moving...I kept moving
dreaming:
Panama...heart of adventure
the hot life of Mexico
the drunkard...the dock worker
Rythum...flash of white hair...winter
the Jesters...the Paragons
rise of the blue heron
breathe through the great rythum
scream through the Shepard
sing through that rock n'roll music
rock n'roll music
rock n'roll music
rock n'roll
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Published in The Patti Smith Fan Club, Journal, #6,
July of 1978 and luckily seen the light of a day again
just recently thanks to Don from Eternal Cafe.