Lincoln Boulevard
(1969)

Beauty the by-word
Of Lincoln Boulevard.
Tall trees, flowing willows,
And leafy shaded drives,
Gardens second to none. Houses
Fully detached, all thirty-three,
And all different, naturally,
In every one a Mr. Jones,
Status judged by what Jones owns.

The daughters date nice boys.
The All-American kind,
With diplomas, certificates.
And stereotype haircuts.
What are your prospects, my boy.
And whom d'you work with?
What's in the bank,
And where will you live?
Church bazaar Sunday,
But today's the school fete,
So you'd better hurry, Mom,
Or you're going to be late.
No, Pop can't make it.
I know he's very sorry,
But he has to play golf
With the company secretary.

Elder son Hiram
Left home yesterday.
He's off to Vietnam
As a proud Green Beret.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
This is the young boy's dream,
or this is Uncle Sam's scheme.

Chins up, Vietnamese,
We'll soon have the VC's
North of the border
And down on their knees.
It's for your own good.
You wait, and you'll see.
This miserable suffering
Will soon be finished.
Pay no heed to Joan Baez,
And her misguided friends,
The true sons of America
Will fight to the end.

Paul Simon's looking for America:
Don't tell me Bernstein found it.
Dylan's singing "I Shall Be Released",
But it's all right, Ma,
He's only bleeding;
And America's dying.

The bold headlines
Of the New York Times
Shatter the apathy
For another short spell.

Kennedy's gone - that makes two:
Gun sales are up, as well.
The U.S. of A. is capping her teeth,
But the cavities are too deep,
So close your mouth.
Do you want the world to see!

The two-day old criminal
Awakes, like a fool,
To be lost in the Maelstrom,
Sucked down the whirlpool.
Watch out, Lincoln Boulevard,
There's a hurricane due,
Only it won't stop at Florida,
It's coming right through.
Your status, and your protocol,
And you new limousine,
Your impregnable respectability,
Hiding the sores behind its screen,
Will go.
And the answer, my friends,
Will be Blowin' in the Wind.

In the east,
Phoebus rises
And the sea of neon fades,
Heralding the Cadillac cascades.
The Rockies are in cloud;
Only the cloud isn't rising.
Winter's coming,
The leaves shower down
And drown
The russet earth.
One thing's left growing,
And growing, and growing.
The harvest's in.
The rains begin,
But will they clean
Each black skin,
Each bottle of gin,
Each rusting tin,
Each garbage bin.
And, in between,
The garbage!
And still it's growing.

The writing's on the tenement walls
A hundred blocks east
And another hundred north,
Scrawled by the children of Hiroshima.
And still the mushroom's growing.

In the east
Phoebus rises
And Lincoln Boulevard yawns, stretches.
And lights its first cigarette,
Its plastic people
Flitting from box to box
In their synthetic world
Of psychoanalysts, ball games,
And drive-in toilets.

Build an ark someone!
But it's already too late.
The lid's hard down tight.
They've not long to wait.
The mushroom has stopped growing

And the finger is on the button.

T. CRAWFORD, M6A