Sometimes it's hard to believe I've lived this long
in the midst of all this passion, death, and pollution--
"Breathe," she said, "and then breathe deeper, come out of this
city, away from these streets here"

"Come into the canyon beyond that hill"

And I went with her hoping, with a desperate will
that the air would be clear, and the cars left behind, and that
the sick maligned conclusions about modernity would soon leave
my mind

So we hiked into the canyon, carrying only bare bones simplicity
But when we reached the high road, and looked out to what we
might see
we saw cages of barbed wire, and a sprawling refuse
of trash and condominiums,
and cars on the loose

Just round the bend the road widened somewhat
and we soon enough realized that we'd definitely been caught

In the worst form of suburban sprawl,
where they took to the hills, where they took to the mountain tops,

And from up there way up on that peak
it wasn't fields of or or treetops we did see,

It was rooftops, and rooftops, more than one could count in
all of eternity -- it was tantamount
to my worst kind of nightmare, and it spread through the
land, and it spread through the river basin
it ruined the redwoods, those old grandaddys--we can't replace
them!

And I asked myself--when I have a family or two, or even three--
is this what I'd want-- would I want this, really--this home on a hill,
that's ruined the wilderness, misunderstanding that continues to ruin it still?

As it kills species, builds new roads every day, and produces
a sickness that's hidden away
behind cotton chintz curtains, and venetian blinds, and hundreds
more of the same tacky mind

Waiting in line to fight to the quick, for their precious bit
of land, so that they might stick
their own ideas of nature there, cut down the beautiful trees,
and use their plot to plant some ugly
little humanly concocted plant hybrid, and a few little plots
of crab grass squares
that grow together, as if anyone cares

Cause no one is out here that truly reveres beauty, or they
wouldn't build these condos, or feel it was their duty

To pave so many roads, put up so many wires
no, they would only come to visit, instead of making a home
in this canyon, in order to "escape" their previous home that'd
already drown in its own urban/suburban mire