I Am 57 Today I Am

I Am 57 Today I Am

I have seen fifty-seven dawns the promise of light

I have seen the rise of the Titan rocket and the fall of the Challenger

I have seen the rise of Camelot and the fall of a president

I have seen the rise of Dylan and the fall of Cobain

I have heard the voice of a prophet crying in darkness

I saw them kill Martin, kill Malcolm, kill Bobby, kill Jack

I saw the rise of our consciousness and the fall of our aspirations

I saw burning banks, burning draft cards, burning bras, burning desires

I saw Watts burning, Detroit burning, Saigon burning, burning, burning

I saw burning Vietnamese napalm girl crying to the camera lens

I saw Cambodia Khymer Rouge killing fields skulls and tibias

I saw Neil Young walk on the moon long before Neil Armstrong ever took the sky

I have seen world war three nuclear holocaust in my lunchbox

I have seen Bikini atoll burning death roasting pig flesh screaming

I have seen baton back breaking Chicago pigs beating the innocents

I have seen four dead Kent State students blood on the grass

I have seen Lennon, better than Jesus, tell us love is all we need so we killed him

I heard George longing for Krishna, and so God killed him.

I stood in the Sea of Tranquility and looked back at the earth

I followed Cesar brown beret Lady of Guadalupe no grapes for ten years que viva la raza

El cabrón murió por nuestros pecados.

I have seen the constitution torn to shreds by patriots.

I heard everything my teachers told me about the land of opportunity

I stood in the unemployment line, my back broken from apathy

I followed the preachers of prosperity until I learned you cannot serve two masters

The bastards never kept their promises

I fell in love with mythological visions of Liz and Dick

I fell in love with garage band dreams but Jerry died in rehab and took the dead with him

I fell in love with the sound of my own words but now we’re just good friends

One foot in the Great Depression and One foot in the Great Society

I have learned not to believe everything I hear.

I have learned not to believe my eyes

I have learned to develop a sense of the absurd, a strange metamorphosis

Kafka could write for Hollywood and create a sureality program.

I have lived fifty-seven years

I have seen my boys to men

There are fewer years ahead than behind

I am over halfway home

I can see it just ahead

Almost there

Almost

there

//Wilson