This city hates me
Or that’s what I thought
But now
As the sounds of drama
Outside our hotel
Mingle and muddle
With the slow realization
Of all the cheap-assed amenities
Inside our barely adequate room
And metastasize

It’s just a sad sad
Sad Francisco

Never mind the shitty signage on the freeway
Or the paltry excuse for an overpriced crab sandwich
Never mind the boarded up every other what must have once been a cool shop or cafe or seafood restaurant
Back in the day
Here on fisherman’s wharf
It all ends up Funneling every tourist dime
To the corporate monsters
Of pier 39

From here it seems that’s all that’s left
Of poor poor
Sad Francisco

But some poor woman somewhere on the street screaming “I just wanna go home you bastard!”
The car alarm that goes off just as one more metal rolling door slams shut
Drunks at the 7-eleven across the street
And the happy tweaker dancing in front of the ripley’s believe it or not
Tell another story

Ok so perhaps I’m not being fair
Perhaps there’s a spectacular Francisco
Just around the corner
after all
it is a Tuesday
in December

But the desperation here
is palpable
In the exactly one
human statue on the street
And the only group of street food vendors
All of them
Selling only hotdogs

There’s also exactly one street artist
doing something very sad looking indeed
With spray paint
And exactly one
Very very bored
Steel drum player

Never mind the sad old man
Playing a very bad saxophone
Along with a very bad recording
of Otis Redding

“Sitting’ on the dock of the bay”

(Note, this is not meant to impugn San Francisco in general or anyone living here. After all it’s just a first impression of what is obviously not this city’s best face but still… )

And now
as I try and get some sleep after a very long day a very sad sounding violinist out on the street plays some incessant sad tune

And this
Somehow
Makes me happy

m(___)m

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