Goodbye & Hello

The antique people are down in the dungeons

Run by machines and afraid of the tax

Their heads in the grave and their hands on their eyes

Hauling their hearts around circular tracks

Pretending forever their masquerade towers

Are not really riddled with widening cracks

And I wave goodbye tô iron

And smile hello to the air

O the new children dance - I am young

All around the balloons - I will live

Swaying by chance - I am strong

To the breeze from the moon - I can give

Painting the sky - you the strange

With the colors of sun - seed of day

Freely they fly - feel the change

As all become one - know the way

The velocity addicts explode on the highways

Ignoring the journey and moving so fast

Their nerves fall apart and they gasp but can't breathe

They run from the cops of the skeleton past

Petrified by tradition in a nightmare they stagger

Into nowhere at all and they look up aghast

And I wave goodbye tô speed

And smile hello to a rose

O the new children play - I am young

Under the juniper trees - I will live

Sky blue or gray - I am strong

They continue at ease - I can give

Moving so slow - you the strange

That serenely they can - seed of day

Gracefully grow - feel the change

And yes still understand - know the way

The king and the queen in their castle of billboards

Sleepwalk down the hallways dragging behind

All their possessions and transient treasures

As they go to worship the electronic shrine

On which is playing the late late commercial

In that hollowest house of the opulent blind

And I wave goodbye to Mammon

And smile hello to a stream

O the new children buy - I am young

All the world for a song - I will live

Without a dime - I am strong

To which they belong - I can give

Nobody owns - you the strange

Anything anywhere - seed of day

Everyone's grown - feel the change

Up so big they can share - know the way

The vaudeville generals cavort on the stage

And shatter their audience with submachine guns

And freedom and violence the acrobat clowns

Do a balancing act on the graves of our sons

While the tapdancing emperor sings: War is peace

And love the magician disappears in the fun

And I wave goodbye to murder

And smile hello to the rain

O the new children can't - I am young

Tell a foe from a friend - I will live

Quick to enchant - I am strong

And so glad to extend - I can give

Handfuls of dawn - you the strange

To kaleidoscope men - seed of day

Come from beyond - feel the change

The great wall of skin - know the way

The bloodless husbands are jesters who listen

Like sheep to the shrieks and commands of their wives

And the men who aren't men leave the women alone

See them all faking love on a bed made of knives

Afraid to discover or trust in their bodies

And in secret divorce they will never survive

And I wave goodbye tô ashes

And smile hello to a girl

O the new children kiss - I am young

They are so proud to learn - I will live

Womanwood bliss - I am strong

And the manfire that burns - I can give

Knowing no fear - you the strange

They take off their clothes - seed of day

Honest and clear - feel the change

As a river that flows - know the way

The antique people are fading out slowly

Like newspapers flaming in mind suicide

Godless and sexless directionless loons

Their sham sandcastles dissolve in the tide

They put on their deathmasks and compromise daily

The new children will live for the elders have died

And I wave goodbye to América

And smile hello to the world