— Poetry & Lyric —

Diamond Dave’s Sestina

Today I tore my ass-less pants
when I tried to do a karate kick.
It’s the exact same kick I did countless times
when we laid down the “Jump” video
way back in the Panama-hot summer of 1984.
Dude, am I ever fat and old.

I’m finding it’s getting really old
when I can’t fit into any of my pants.
I long for another time; that glorious year of 1984
when all I needed to do was kick
my leg above my peroxided hair in a video
and I got to have sweaty groupie sex eight times

a day. Actually, I had sex as many times
as I wanted to until that fifteen-year-old
who danced so nice in our “Hot For Teacher” video
forgot to take her sequined spandex pants
when she left my dressing room. Her dad wanted to kick
my ass that dark, dark day in 1984.

Mostly though, everything was top jimmy in 1984.
The record went platinum four whole times
and that was truly a great big kick
for me, Eddie, Michael, and good old
Alex V.H. himself. Remember how Alex never wore pants,
but only these tiny nylon running shorts in every video?

Like my hair, I wish that the golden age of the music video
hadn’t started disappearing sometime around 1984.
Back when I could dress with a red jockstrap over my pants
and still have sex so many damn times
with unending mall-haired chicks both fresh and old.
It’s days like this I could just kick

myself for ever thinking that I could kick
it alone without the band. Sure, I made a video
reäppearance when I recorded that old
Beach Boys song one short year after we released 1984.
But after that solo victory, it was mostly bad times
as the market shriveled for insane rock gods in Day-Glo pants.

When I kick back and reminisce about 1984,
I’m glad there’s no hidden video camera to film the times
when I still wear my stretchy gigolo pants and pretend I’m not old.