[ Pulse the smoky throb of Las Vegas ]

Pulse the smoky throb of Las Vegas
light flying like the highway pictures of San Fran you see
in movies and those cool animated pictures
college students buy for their dorms, just
so they can have a window onto a world
other than the campus quad....

and there's a life here, and

a death and a living death and a dying life...

Zombies pouring nickels into slots forget
that their children are waiting out in the pool
under the supervision of a man named "Paco"
and no one else
Though they had the best babysitters back home.

And I drink it all in
With my martini and a flavored cigarette
Watching the dice roll out of the cup toward me like
a voodoo fortune teller's finger bones
Stating whether that dark haired man
will be my bane or my pleasure
Dear God! Please, don't tell
that seven's NOT my lucky number,
And in fact,
Now that I think on it...
I had no luck to begin with
So I guess I've got nothing to lose, because
Concrete covers the green
and lights of desert sunsets
But they've forgotten what real sand is
The stuff that gets in your clothes and your
eyes screwed shut.