San Francisco Poem

The rapture comes in North Beach
And men like a jetstream of angels
Float above the flat scent of Chinatown
And gleefully make heavenly love to the black
Suited ghosts of beautiful boys eternally
And cleaned triumphantly of revolutionary
Narcosis they dance in the pacific breeze 
That masturbates the sky hung branches of
Muir Woods and chills the strung out bullshit
Flower children who rise belligerent from 
Haight-Ashbury and swirl effortless and enlightened
Into the espresso cups of saints.
Hey Alcatraz man, what's your problem
Why do you look so glum? Is it me?
Standing windswept on the wharf
Contemplating the swim and did he
Make it and how would it feel and
Weeping tears of nuclear joy for Alcatraz
Concrete fucker of the Bay.
Seen from Twin Peaks whose grassy
Nipples get sucked by gods, Zeus
On olympus taking photographs with the
Japanese girls who wander aimless
On a lease of life from a starched existence
Who vulnerable to get laid by Mr. Fifty
Years on bop apocalypse magi who carries
His gifts to the Connecticut Pilgrim
Innocent messiah wasting joyfully in
His cardboard manger who sleeps with
The pity of the stupid sons of the Mayflower
Who blindly march past beauty to get
Scared of the faggots cruising skaters in 
Union Square. Brilliance! Morning! Noon!
Evening! Dusk! Night! Night, when 
The Bay bridge picks out its shape from
Blackness in man's glistening filament
Of electronic wonder! Dusk, when the light
Reddens its power to float behind the line 
Of Sausilito and the majesty of the Golden Gate 
Spanned by the fingers of workers, once idolised,
Who let down the purveyors of a Red thought
That pales when compared to the Scarlet
Doorway to heaven that makes the Them the
Opposition anyway! Evening, when light
Changes! Noon, when lovers scream! Morning,
Wreathed in mist and you can't see the 
Pagoda from the road! Love! Joy!
That's the word, buddy, you can see it
Either way. From bored pastel shaded
Ensuite working fireplace Air Condition
A-OK comfortable polished roadway
Clear and a car for all the children love
To its prescribed degree don't get involved
Share bond Shares Bonds and a lie in on
Sundays from the fridge into a plastic cup I see how
Desolate equals misery but you, in your image
You don't get the Spark the crackle of 
Imagination the voltage of genius the lightning
Of Discovery the brilliant supernatural aura
That surrounds a hollow room of literature
So eager to leap out in a barrage of
Exclamation that would make 
Hercules cry with tears of what is central
To everything: The fire escapes with
Their wrought-Iron ladders, The low hung
Wired city of information, The colours,
The couples, The arstists, The art, The 
Grinning super-happy intelligent negro
Beggar  whose eyes sing a thousand angelic
Songs and the cups and the tables
And the Beach Blanket Babylon Boulevard
And Garcia and Ferlinghetti and the trace of
Capone and the thrill of opposition and
The adrenaline of madness and the old
Alcoholic shouting mantras from the
Rooftops who once was a well-cut jew
And who is now buried in the Poetry of
Millions and essentially in victory in
Success and in the Explosive, Seismic,
Eruption and Catastrophe of Joy!

		    Simon Clayton, 1997