What the hell do I know?
Spent the sixties on tank and cargo ships
tramping from one obscure port to another.
Went ashore whenever I could (hated bloody oceans)
and when at sea and sober read Ginsberg, Bukowsky
and the rest of the beat lot, wrapped in a mystic fog.

I didn’t know that they were famous
just thought that they were drunks, like me,
looking for something they couldn’t define.
Liked to read Hemingway (and he ain’t a poet),
but didn’t like the man,
too manly for my taste;
Suspicious of men who throw their masculinity about.

I sure liked to read their stuff,
felt at home in their world,
so totally unlike mine (or, perhaps not)
Yeah, but I never thought they were different from me;
you see. I belong to that generation,
even though it took me a long time to understand
that I’m one of them