Mexico City '73

I found them lying on the floor, always whispering
And cutting verses out of poetry to make anthologies
We were 17 in Mexico City in '73
Killing the old gods and drowning in the mezcal scene

And I thought that I was an academic
Til the two of them came in and cut my lecturer to ribbons
We barely existed as we drifted to the houses of those literary kids
Drinking to post-war French fiction

And we will not grow old here
If you don't go
Back to Spain
And spend the next two decades wandering, wandering, wandering
Don't let this city forget your name
Well we started a movement, we're gonna fucking make it

The kids that we spilled out the ink in our veins with
Have gotten engaged and make minimum wages
Well I dearly miss the endless conversations
In the night clubs where we'd tell ourselves we'd never see daylight

So we'll drive up to the north part of Sonora near the border
To find a lost poet that we aren't sure ever existed anymore
Staring blankly through the windshield at the desert
As if looking through a door
Well I see the mixed race Mixtec children of conquistadors
Reaching out to grasp
The bloody manuscript of Latin American literature
An etching made in darkness to the gunshots of another dictator
Well I might die by the pen but I will not die by the sword

And I will not forget the first time
These two savage dropouts convinced me
The city was ours
And that it was not a crime to write poems all day
And live fictions all night