Re: virus: Secret decoder ring (from: Level Four?)

B. Lane Robertson (metaphy@hotmail.com)
Mon, 03 Aug 1998 14:08:26 PDT

YOWL
Robert McLachlan (R.McLachlan@massey.ac.nz) found this in an old 80's
issue of The New Republic, and was even nice enough to convert it to
HTML himself! I suffered through the Reagan-happy years of the 1980's,
and I think this is a pretty cool parody.
YOWL
On the 30th anniversary of "Howl."
CHRISTOPHER BUCKLEY
PAUL SLANSKY
D.C.-L.A.-D.C. 1986
For Jay McInerney
I
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by stress frazzled
overtired burnt-out
jogging through suburban streets at dawn as suggested by the late James
Fixx,
career-minded yupsters burning for an Amstel Light watching Stupid Pet
Tricks,
who upwardly mobile and designer'd and bright-eyed and high sat up
working in the track-lit glow of the Tribeca loft skimming through the
Day Timer while padding the expense account,
who passed through universities and saved their asses hallucinating
Grateful Dead posters and eating Sara Lee while watching the war on TV,
who were graduated and went on to law schools burning to save the world,
who brewed decaffinated coffee doing their yoga in alligator shirts and
listening to the latest Windham Hill Sampler,
who ate chocolate croissants in outdoor café s and drank blush wine on
Columbus Avenue washed down with a little Percodan with Dove bars with
Diet coke with Lean Cuisine,
stopping by on the way home for a pound of David's cookies telling each
other of their fears on intimacy and their need for space and inability
to commit - for now,
who watched Mary Tyler Moore reruns and wept for Rhoda and worried about
acid rain and the mercury in the swordfish while strung out on
cyclamates faces flushed with MSG even after specifically making a point
of mentioning to the waiter not to put it in,
who prowled through uncertain money markets chewing Tums and doing lines
with the Hispanics in the mail room sitting in the gents with
baby-laxative runs while the boss buzzes and the secretary says you're
on the phone to Bonn,
who stayed up too late working out their relationships 'n' things
feeling the gnawing rat-fear that they hadn't been communicating lately
and the urgent pounding screaming need to think about their priorities,
yacketayakking analyzing thinking it through making constructive
suggestions as the easstern sky flamed in raw Ralph Lauren pastels,
got to get away for a few days but the Hartmann luggage is being
repaired oh,
who needs this wandering through Needless-Markup wailing (inside) for
the baby seals and the bunnies slaughtered for lipstick remembering all
the unanswered anti-vivisection junk mail on the way to the appliances
section to beg another blade for the Cuisinart,
who subscribed to Gourmet and the American Lawyer and after an
exhausting search found Jamaica time-shares in the classifieds for only
$1200 a month coping as best they could with the Negro beach boys
wanting to sell them ganja,
paying outrageous sums for bottled water and having to complain about
the maid service and the warm orange juice knowing they should have gone
to Cape Cod instead where the Peugot mopeds fart carbon monoxide and the
half-eaten lobster rolls rot in wax paper on the sidewalks and the
Republican men in lime-green corduroys with little orange elephants bray
as their wives buy overpriced scrimshaw,
who nudged and nuzzled over margaritas and dreamed of endless throbbing
hot sticky sex but Not tonite dear I have a yeast infection,
running on spongy Reeboks to sublimate their lust then plunging into
Bright Lights, Big City
who upped their nightly hits of Valium from two to five mgs and worried
if they were going to be groggy in the morning,
who hollow-eyed and febrile read the theater reviews in unread issues of
the New Yorker yes the New Yorker,
who watched re-reruns of Mary Tyler Moore and decided they hated Rhoda,
who skimmed the Banana Republic catalog with brain-dead gaze wondering
if they really needed Ethiopian saddlebags,
who padded back and forth to the john for endless glasses of water while
worrying about refinancing at ten and an eighth and waited for the
fiendish tweet of birds and the thud of the Wall Street Journal on the
porch,
who took a little tootsky after their Yoplait just to get going and
buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzed along in the carpool yattering to the
gray-flannelled bottisatvas in the backseat about rowing machines and
Eddie Murphy's homo jokes,
ah Jay while you are not safe I am not safe and now Ransom is
remaindered at Waldenbooks and you're really in a bind -
and who therefore drown in butter-flavored popcorn at the Cineplex as
the answering machines cutely speak to strangers and Discover cards are
mailed to the incorrect addresses while Mohawked clerks at Tower Records
with little crucifixes in their ears play "Pillow Talk" and everything
you want they only have in Beta.
II
Yuck! Gross! Eeewww! Buying crack from the zombies in the park! Closing
out the trust fund! Checking into the rehab!
III
Jay McInerney! I'm with you at Area
where the shark swims on the wall
I'm with you David Letterman on the tower
where you drop watermelons and TVs and bowling balls
I'm with you Gary Hart in New Hampshire
where you stammer and yammer about New Ideas
I'm with you Don Johnson in Miami
where you don't wear socks
I'm with you Jerry Rubin on Wall Street
where you only hear yippie when the Dow hits a high
I'm with you Donald Trump on Fifth Avenue
where Steven Spielberg has an apartment in your building
I'm with you John McEnroe in England
where you appear on world television treating people like scum
I'm with you Maria Shriver in Hyannisport
where a wedding gift from Kurt Waldheim has arrived
I'm with you John Zaccaro at Middlebury
where you pursue independent study projects
I'm with you Doctor Ruth on cable
where you giggle with your guests about orgasm
I'm with you Ron Jr cavorting
in your underwear on national television
I'm with you Mike Deaver in Bitburg
where your mind was on buying a car
I'm with you Billy Crystal in too many places
where your routines have not aged well
I'm with you Brooke Shields at Princeton
where you - but who cares?
I'm with you on the Upper East Side
pricing modems
I'm with you on the Upper East Side
stopping into the Food Emporium for a quart of lo-fat milk
I'm with you on the Upper East Side
eating sushi and Ecstacy
I'm with you on the Upper East Side
looking for myself in People magazine

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