Here is a song I wrote. It would be great if you'd take a listen. It's quite good... The World Is Full Of Whores
ANOTHER DAY DOWN THE SEWER
I was just watching Channel 4 News, about Romanian sewer-kids, that's to say Romanian children who'd taken haven in their local sewer network. Quite how you go about this, I'm not sure, but it seems to begin by being in an orphanage, probably getting abused, and then wandering the streets until you fall in with likeminded lost souls, get addicted to something, and then, when you're properly initiated, opens up before you a manhole cover, leading you down, down into your new life.
It looked quite cosy down there, although lacking in most of the facilities we tend to take for granted. About ten kids were clustered in a tunnel, seemingly not knee-high in sewage, presumably because there are tunnels down there used as access points for those whose task it is to keep the shit flowing properly under Bucharest streets. There they were, blotchy and deeply bewildered, hangin' out in the underworld, with occasional visits from some guy, their dealer and apparent chief, who dished out the wares, so long as the relevant notes were placed in his waiting palm. He had the look and air of a disaffected Billy Idol fan, black leather waistcoat, chains'n'such, and hair made silver by some aerosol he was also selling as a stimulant.
I can only imagine the bonding and sense of collective bondage these forlorn high-schoolers must have known, too young to truly hate each other, too young to have lost all hope, even though no hope had ever really been offered them, too young even to think 'this is no good, it's time for a change...' No, it was a kind of waiting-room, coming-and-going-room down there in the service-duct of your Bucharest sewer, and if you were lucky enough to have a few minutes high, it didn't matter where you were, what your T-cell count was, who came to you in dreams, a near-silhouette in a care-home dormitory, reassuring, rationalising. When you're high, however low the starting point, the aim is just to feel ok...not indulgence, or luxury, or sensual overload...no, just ok will do. Wouldn't you go down a manhole cover if you thought that's where your friends were, your future was, a passing peace of mind might be?
They only really came overground for funerals.
And that is all I have to say today.
