Science Fiction and the Year 2000

When we were young we'd do the math
Suspend the numbers in our head
Add and subtract how old we'd be
And would we see
The year Two Thousand

When we were young we were naive
We put our faith in make-believe
In men of science who thought they'd seen
The way we'd be
In the year Two Thousand

All our cars would fly
High up in the sky
We would go to fashion shows of edible clothes
Lunch would be a pill
We would get our fill between that
And the hat we were wearing
We would very soon
Live up on the moon
With our neighbors from Venus and Saturn
And we'd be content
With our president
A radical female Alien
In the year Two Thousand

When we were young
We'd speculate
About the ways life would be great
There'd be no hate
We couldn't wait
Until that magical magical date
The year Two Thousand

We would have machines
Hooked up to our brains
That would let us travel to places unknown
We would have the means to communicate
Without ever having to pick up a phone
There'd be no disease
There'd be no unrest
Every man would be a major success
In reality, Nineteen-ninety-nine
And technology
Can't live up to the hype

When we were young
We didn't know
That time is fast but change is slow
That problems come
And problems go
We'd just be older then
In the year Two Thousand

And if this world falls short of Utopia
I, for one, am glad for what we've got
That we still sing a song from beginning to end
We still write a letter to a childhood friend
We still love a person
Body and soul
We ring the new
And cherish the old
We'll drink a cup of kindness yet
To the memory of Science Fiction
And the year
The year
Two Thousand