The Slide from Smash Hits by Roger Dean Young

As I sit by my window
On a warm November day
Boys on BMX’s
Wheel their worries all away
On the steps of the tabernacle
They’re rolling up a joint
They might not remember what they learned today
But what they learned is ‘What’s the point?’

Of relying on hope
In this wavering time
Relying on a plastic bag instead
Trading crime for petty crime
With five in your pocket
You can always get by
You can always paint your name on a concrete wall
And let the troubling slide

The water mains lay belly up
Gaping grave at my feet
Layers of asphalt now reveal
The traveling history of my street
That which we don’t want to recognize
We slip into the ground
If we bury the troubling deep enough
We can barely hear the sound

Of a whimpering hope
In this wavering time
To be left in a ditch in a plastic bag
Hardly seems an earth-shattering crime
With five in your pocket
You can always get by
You can always paint your name on a concrete wall
And let the troubling slide

The sun was uncommonly bright today
Autumn leaves flakes of gold
She pulled one down to reminisce
As if she’d suddenly grown old
I’d seen her shine on a high school stage
It was Remembrance Day
She made me remember
All that glitter’s real
Sunlight on a grinnin’ face

And a flicker of hope
In this wavering time
Believing that the plastic bag we are thinking of
Bears a lesson to be cashed in rhyme
With five in your pocket
You can always get by
You can always paint your name on a concrete wall
And let the troubling slide

• Folk
• ramshackle
• Victoria