The beauty parlor's filled with sailors,
And in walks the blind commissioner,
they've got him in a trance.
One hand is tied to the tightrope walker,
the other is in his pants.
They need somewhere to go
This lady and I look out tonight
Cinderella, she seems so easy
Takes one to know one, she smiles
Puts her hands in her back pockets
And in walks Romeo, he's moaning
You belong to me, I believe
Someone says you're in the wrong place,
The only sound you can hear
No, I feel ya, she's neat the window
She already is an old maid
To her, death is quite romantic
Her profession's her religion
Her sin is her lifelessness
upon Noah's great rainbow
Peeping in on Desolation and hope
The stars are beginning to hide
The fortune -telling lady
Has already taken all her things inside
Well, except for Cain and Abel
And the hunchback of Notre
Everybody's either making love
And the good Samaritan, he's dressing,
he's getting ready for the show
He's going down to the carnival tonight,
Now Einstein discusses Robin Hood
With his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago
With his friend a jealous monkey
Oh, he looked so immaculately frightful,
as he bummed a cigarette.
And you went on sniffing grain pipes,
and reciting the alphabet.
Well, you wouldn't think to look at him,
but he was famous long ago.
We're playing electric violin
Dr. Phil, he keeps his world
And all his sexless patients,
they're all trying to blow it up.
His nurse, some local loser,
she's in charge of the cyanide hole.
She also keeps the cards that read
Yes, they all play on the penny whistle
Yes, you can hear them blow
If you lean your head out
Bar it up on the distillation room
they've nailed the curtains
they're getting ready for the
feast fandom of the opera
in the perfect image of a priest
And they're spoon -feeding Casanova
To get him to feel more assured
Then they'll kill him with
After poisoning him with words
And the fandom's shouting,
Get out of here, you don't know
Casanova's just being punished
We're going to Decimation Road
Now at midnight all the agents
They go and round up everyone
who knows more than they do
Then they take them to the factory
where the heart attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders
Then the kerosene is brought
by insurance men who go to
make sure nobody's escaping
Oh praise be to Nero's Neptune,
the Titanic sails at dawn
And everybody's shouting,
Ezra Pound and T .S. Elliott,
while Calypso singers laugh at them,
and fishermen throw flowers
between the windows of the sea,
where lonely mermaids float.
An d no one has to think too much
about the desolation road.
Yes, I received your letter yesterday
about the time the door not broke
When you asked how I was doing,
was that some kind of joke?
All these people that you mentioned,
yes, I know that they're quite lame.
I have to rearrange their faces
and give them all another name.
Right now, I can't read too good,
don't send me no more letters, no