Eight-sided Red Warning

Thick pretty smoke-stacks chafe the faces

of stand-alone city youngins

kneeling on side streets with their knees in mirky drain water

on the dirty asphalt, circling a dented stop sign.

And next to a sun-worn mural of Jack Kerouac, burning fumes

and sugar strips throw a film of

distortions on the eyes of the already-blind

censored minds of middle class America.

It's 1964 and the times have changed. The music just got good

and there's this thing called freedom.

That's the word on the street, and it used to only ring a bell

but recently there's a beat of a drum never

heard over these boxy radios, never seen on TV shows

and it's not left to anyone -- no moms, no teachers,

no dads, no kids, no beavers. 'Cause now,

that makes no sense.

And the only thing that works is a four-letter word --

B.E.A.T. -- and it spells out recovery in any light.

And people love the smell of unwatched life, even through

the choking smoke clouds intoxicating

the air with high hopes and fingers shot higher,

like a bird with new wings, flying over things

as crazy as kids praying to an eight-sided red warning

beat in 'cause someone wouldn't be stopped.