Canto 5: MONEY

By Rosé

(CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE)

So since I spent time on the road

And constantly changed my abode

I put into effect

A little plan I had devised

But never yet had finalized

To build my self-respect

I'd find a home that I could rent

More of a mansion than a tent

Comfortable and spacious

Lease it for just a month or so

In some big town like Tokyo

Where living's always gracious

I'd hire a girl to cook and clean

Her kid, as part of the routine

 Would sing while he erected

 A fairyland with little blocks

 I'd put my name on the mailbox

 (A name I'd pre-selected)

Soon all arrangements had been made

 For this elaborate masquerade

And everything was ripe

 You'd think I'd lived there all my life

 My dog, my little kid, my wife

My slippers and my pipe

I'd advertise to rent the place

 For half a year –– this gorgeous space

 This perfect paradise

To some upstanding gentlefolk

 Who didn't drink and didn't smoke

At half the market price!

I'd see each one alone somewhere

The dining room, the kitchen stair

 Even in the closet

 Two hundred families arrived

 And every one of them contrived

 To give me a deposit

But most of them took me aside

 And said they were so satisfied

"Excuse my being blunt

 I see no reason to delay

With your permission, can we pay

 The whole half- year in front?"

For several days I raked it in

 I bought a brand new zeppelin

 But the part that's really tough

When renting out someone's chateau

 Is when to stop –– it's hard to know

 Just how much is enough

I handed out six hundred keys

To the front door, got guarantees

 That everything was swell

To make so many people glad

 Well, now, I'm off to Trinidad

 As far as I can tell

I think with pleasure of the day

(Unfortunately, I'll be away)

 When husbands and their domin

Eering wives arrive by twelves

To meet nice folk just like themselves

 Who have so much in common

I just set up in some new town

 I'm lounging in my dressing gown

 And thinking that it's grand

 This bonus of a thousand fold

 Why rent? Three times this afternoon I sold

 The house and all the land!

Now, money is a funny thing

It has a way of vanishing

Before your very eyes

It turns to food, to clothes, to smoke

This morning you were flush and now you're broke

No matter what its size

Your bank-roll is diminishing

 It rolls away, a ball of string

 That's always getting smaller

 It disappears –– the more you earn

 The richer you become, the more you yearn

 To be a social crawler

You must improve your way of life

 Another mink coat for the wife

 Take limos everywhere,

A better college for the kid

You have become a financial invalid

While still a millionaire

So it turns out that you have pandered

Your very soul to raise the standard

Of living to a point

That's just beyond what you can make

And now you won't eat anything but cake

You hate the lousy joint

You live in, if you had some dough

You'd move into that smart chateau

And cater to your gout

 Tonight you dine on roast gazelle

While several families do very well

On just what you throw out

You used to think ten thousand bucks

Was quite enough to live De Luxe

But now it's not the case

Ten thousand bucks! Your concubines

Drop that each month between imported wines

 And lotions for the face

You dream you're floating in your yacht

 In some imaginary spot

 You've just received the news

 That half the world is burning up

 You and some billionaires sit down to sup

 Onassis, Howard Hughes

The wine is excellent tonight

 It stimulates the appetite

 With brandy you all laugh

You have prepared for the event

The world is gone –– almost fifty percent

 But –– you own the other half!

You and your friends have reached the place

 Where there is nothing left to chase

 You've taken all the plunder

Beyond what you can comprehend

 So that, no matter what you ever spend

You're never going under

You dream, then wake in icy sweat

 None of the world is yours as yet

 But there're some bills to pay

After your scrambled eggs and ham

You'll have to start inventing some new scam

To get you through the day

Smoked sunglasses for an eclipse

 Some lifetime bogus memberships

To an exclusive club

 Perhaps you'll sell the Brooklyn Bridge

 Convince an Eskimo he needs a fridge

Sell mermaids a hot tub

You married rich but soon went through

Your wife's entire revenue

In hardly any time

You sold her bonds, her deeds, her stocks

The jewels in her jewel box

 Before you turned to crime

You sold her heirlooms in a pinch

 Her wedding ring without a flinch

 The sparkle in her teeth

 You sold a hundred times again

You'd have her lift her skirts and then

You'd sell what's underneath!

Now, every man has got his price

 Some want a lot to sacrifice

A mother or a dad

While some will sell a friend real cheap

 For just a couple bucks, while he's asleep

 Before he knows he's had

And some, who after selling all

The land, the house, the banquet hall

The stars out of the night

Their families, what's on the shelves

At last will sell their very selves

That's if the price is right

Now, every ten years here on earth

They celebrate the virgin birth

 Of money and they choose

One man who soars above the rest,

Who understands the ways of money best

And send him on a cruise

It's been a decade since the last

Official immemorial blast

With everyone aboard

So, the entire universe

Is wondering who'll win the purse

Receive the grand award

The fabled prize, mankind's acclaim

 (That tarnished trophy cup of fame)

 The tickertape downtown

 The cruise, applause. The world waits stunned

 To see who'll win the purple cummerbund

The Pearl Upon the Crown

On Wall Street shady financiers

 Have staked their office staff's careers

 On who'll win this event

 While Moslems wager minarets

 A well-known slum-lord-guru bets

 Another tenement

They're betting thousand dollar bills

They're leaning out of window sills

 And falling in the street

To place a few last minute bets

They're tumbling down past crowded luncheonettes

 And landing on their feet

At home and off in foreign lands

They seek the man who understands

The nature of the beast

Who best of all can comprehend

Why God made money for the rich to spend

And he who has the least

Is usually the one who's picked

 Some poor financial derelict

 Who hasn't got a cent

 Instead of bankers, oil sheiks

Or wealthy ocean-liner-owning Greeks

Or heads of government

Because the man who doesn't rate

A pot in which to urinate

Instead of on the floor

Who's penniless, deprived from birth

Is just the man who knows what money's worth

Not some inheritor

Who's filthy rich before he's born

Then drops a fortune to adorn

And pamper his new wife

Who pals around with kings at court

The wealthy man spends money just for sport

The poor man for his life

The principle is not elitist

God knows success is counted sweetest

 By those who ne'er succeed

To comprehend a nectar (or

 A dollar bill, a louis d'or)

Requires sorest need

And so, the field was narrowed down

 By several judges of renown

To three pure saps who knew

 Beyond all others, rich and poor

 That no matter what discomfort you endure

You cannot take it with you

First, there's Slim Jim who's in New York

He's brushing roaches off his fork

 Off his portfolios

 The window's shut -––he'd rather steam

Than hear a hundred million natives scream

 Above their radios

He lays his fork upon the plate

Pretending that the scraps he ate

Was some splendid dinner

 And licks his lips like a gourmet

One hundred twenty pounds and every day

 He grows a little thinner

The roaches fight for tiny scraps

The size of cities on world maps

 They're bright-eyed and alert

 Well-fed and sleek like millionaires

 Perhaps they dine on grand buffets upstairs

Then drop down for dessert

His collar's frayed, his cuffs are worn

His one good pair of shoes is torn

The bottom of his boots

Is separated from the top

The shoes keep walking after his feet stop

His last pack of cheroots

Is crumpled, gone, and now he struts

Around the loft searching for butts

Something to ease the pain

Of several days without a meal

He almost slips on a banana peel

His leg starts in to drain

From an old wound that's really killin'

No money to buy penicillin

 It feels like a grenade

 Exploding pain without a pause

No money to buy dressings, to buy gauze

 Not even a band-aid

Perhaps they'll have to amputate

 Which won't help him to put on weight

 Maybe some alcohol

 Will elevate his mood –– it's hard

When you're dealt the lowest possible card

 To be above it all

If money isn't everything

How come it's so embarrassing

After a taxi ride

Or after dinner with a date

In some posh restaurant where you ate

The best they could provide

A touch embarrassing, I say

 When afterwards you have to pay

 The cabby or the waiter

The girl has started in to weep

 She can't believe she's dated such a creep

 A first-class second-rater

Your fingers fumble through your coat

Excuses tangle in your throat

 The manager's discreet

 He doesn't bother to suggest

The kitchen or immediate arrest

He just throws you in the street

Back home, the rent is overdue

Your clothes out in the avenue

The landlord isn’t lenient

The rent’s been due for half a year

You’ve spent your last buck on a glass of beer

It’s very inconvenient

And over in Hawaii, Trace

(One more financial basket case)

Painting masterpieces

Is glad he isn’t going back

To make another trip, he’d have to pack

No clothes in no valises

But in that tropic paradise

A very little will suffice

 To get you through the days

Some cigarettes, a hunk of cheese

Bananas, coconuts, anemones

Grease burgers, Milky Ways

Also he finds he’s more creative

Now that he’s been going native

And learning how to live

Within the limits nature sets––

As long as there’s a pack of cigarettes

There’s nothing he won’t forgive

He's selling works that are acclaimed

 They're numbered, matted, signed and framed

With wire and a hook

 Each one a perfect specimen

 Five bucks apiece, then down to three for ten

 If someone stops to look

But even if he works all day

Selling, no, giving them away

 No matter what he earns

 He'll never rise above the flaw

That marks him out a victim of the law

Of diminishing returns

And yet, although he'll never sock

 Enough away to leave that rock

 By some unnatural quirk

He's able to live very nice

In that quaint lava-covered paradise

With very little work

So, he'll put in two hours each week

Selling those gems, so rare, unique

With uncompromising zest

 No matter what –– unless that breeze

Holds just the slightest hint of rain or he’s

 A little bit depressed

This chap who's floating in the orb

Of debt, unable to absorb

The least financial shock

Uncushioned, broke, insolvent, flat

A monetary acrobat

Toppled, collapsed, in hock

Can you believe that with his mind

(The fellow's actually money-blind)

This simple, honest man

Composed an economic law

So perfect, so without a flaw

So cosmopolitan

So obvious, yet so obscure

Only a bona fide amateur

 Could follow up the trail

And find the truth despite the odds

That principle inspired by the Gods

 The non-sliding wage scale!

It came to him in crystal light

 (And history will mark that night)

 He woke up with a shout

 He clearly saw the lean precision

 The overwhelming brilliance of a vision

He saw beyond a doubt

That if every single human being

Knew that the state was guaranteeing

A thousand bucks a week

No matter what his occupation

From the leader of a nation

Down to a circus freak

Then everybody could relax

There'd be no words like income tax

 Or how much do you make

 Each man would get the same amount

 With no deductions and with no discount

Or computerized mistake

And now economists all hail

The Trace Purcell non-sliding scale

 With one majestic sweep

The plan unrolled itself at dawn

The vision struck, then passed –– he gave a yawn

And fell right back to sleep

And out in old New Mexico

Young Tom twirls his mustachio

And thinks of the Marines

Where every day he had three meals

He's straining to remember how it feels

And wondering if it means

Despite how many stones you carve

All living artists have to starve

Perhaps another hitch

Since only after death, your art

Becomes so fashionable, so smart

And someone else gets rich

Perhaps it's just some cosmic joke

But when you're on the road and broke

Exhausted, starved and numb

From hitching rides all through the night

And waking up half-dead before first light

In some deserted slum

You almost have to laugh out loud

 The sky is clear but there's one cloud

That's pouring down on you

 A smart sedan goes roaring by

You have to laugh if you don't want to cry

 There's nothing else to do

Ironic, when you think of all

The money spent on alcohol

The stacks of shining chips

You fed to the casino wheels

Like children tossing little fish to seals

The hundred dollar tips

You gave to everyone in sight

The bellhops, women of the night

 You forced them on objectors

You'd stuff a C-note in the shirt

Of waiters just for coffee and dessert

 Of newsboys, toll-collectors

To pay a bill, you'd flash a roll

Like something grown out of control

Immense. Out on the town

Chaps didn't drop a grand, you'd snub

 You were a member of the Bwana's Club

The Pearl Upon the Crown

Remember when you bought the land

Where several cities used to stand

 In the mountains of Peru

 You paid the millions they were worth

Then flattened them into the earth

 Because they blocked the view

And every time you met a girl

 Who gave you just the slightest whirl

You'd buy her brand-new clothes

Give diamond rings at rendezvous

And now you're staring at your shoes

But you're looking at your toes

You used to have as many boots

 As Sunset Strip has prostitutes

 From every kind of skin

 Iguana, serpent, ostrich, eel

So soft, there was no way that you could feel

What you were walking in

And now, if you had just one pair

 To sell or hock or even wear

While standing in the rain

 You'd count it as a stroke of luck

 You'd trade those cobra boots for just one buck

To help you ease the pain

Another car comes racing by

Inside they all look warm and dry

They're slowing in the flood

At last, a ride –– how grandiose

But no such luck, they're only coming close

To splatter you with mud...

Three fellows born out of their time

 Between them, they might raise a dime

If each could float a loan

 Like lovers who are never blessed

With the rewards of love, they know wealth best

 As I have clearly shown

So, now's the time for you to make

 Your choice, for God and money's sake