i could a done a lot worse than sit in skid row drinkin wine to know that nothing matters after all to know there s no real difference between the rich and the poor to know that eternity is neither drunk nor sober to know it young and be a poet coulda gone into business and ranted and believed that god was concerned instead i squatted in lonesome alleys and nobody saw me just my bottle and what they saw of it was empty and i did it in cornfields graveyards to know that the dead don t make noise to know that the cornstalks talk sittin in alleys diggin the neons and watching cathedral custodians wring out their rags neath the church steps sittin and drinkin wine and in railyards being divine to be a millionaire yet to prefer curlin up with a poorboy of tokay in a warehouse door facing long sunsets on railroad fields of grass to know that the sleepers in the river are dreaming vain dreams to squat in the night and know it well to be dark solitary eye nerve watcher of the world s whirling diamond