(Don Van Vliet)

Are you with me on this, people?



The man with the woman head

Polynesian wallpaper made the face stand out,

a mixture of Oriental and early vaudeville jazz poofter,

forming a hard, beetle-like, triangular chin much like a praying mantis.

Smoky razor-cut, low on the ear neck profile.

The face the color of a nicotine-stained hand.

Dark circles collected under the wrinkled, folded eyes,

map-like from too much turquoise eyepaint.

He showed his old tongue through ill-fitting wooden teeth,

stained from too much opium, chipped from the years.

The feet, brown wrinkles above straw loafers.

A piece of cocoanut in a pink seashell caught the tongue and knotted into thin white strings.

Charcoal grey Eisenhower jacket zipped into a load of green ascot.

A coil of ashes collected on the white-on-yellow dacs.

Four slender bones with rings and nails endured the weight of a hard fast black rubber cigarette holder.

I could just make out Ace as he carried the tray and mouthed,

"You cheap son of a bitch" as a straw fell out of a Coke, cartwheeled into the gutter.

So this was a drive-in restaurant in Hollywood,

So this was a drive-in restaurant in Hollywood,

So this was a drive-in restaurant in Hollywood.