In the bright-lit railway station, 3 A.M.
in a town whose active life is at an end
I was met by a rich man dressed in a panda fur
who said, «If I can keep smiling I can change the world.»
What world?
«Lord Straight Banana, Lord Paper Twine,
Lord Biting Yo-Yo, they’re all friends of mine.
Lord Trannie Dolequeue, Lord Private Zoo,
Lord Hanging Bishop and Lord Valium, too.»
«I know you think you have a job
but the whole world knows it’s ended.
Why do you laugh at the dying of the senile god
on whom your devilish life depended?»
Shop-soiled and broken
in a part not clearly seen
You’ll have no Armegeddon, no more screams
Pleasant dreams…
CHORUS:
Your world, your world, your world customer
Your world, your world, your world, your world
I said, «I’m sure your faith in what you cannot see
has made your slumbers sounder but it won’t work for me.
I am sick of fresh starts, of the promises I’ve heard
from my lips and others of a brighter world.»
«Now I’m a punchdrunk sailor who cannot picture land,
an exhausted atom in a grain of sand.
They who can’t be frozen like a teenage corpse
must be isolated and tied up in knots.»
Fake chrome and a lick of paint
and a change of name announced
by some menswear dummy turned messenger
of a master whose name he cannot pronounce
You feast on bargain-basement dregs
Get your self-delusions off the well-worn peg
No new hierarchy, female or male
No Santa, Elvis or Holy Grail
Shop-soiled and clueless, too indebted to inspect
what both feeds and defets you—no respect
I’m beaten, but I still reject
this world, just like a sentence
Without crime or guilt or sin
so give the panda back his skin
and give the berries back their gin—CHORUS