I.
I watched the youth of my generation fall away with the changing times
Done over by love, life, and the economy from which we thrive
Poisoned by the media, who deviously deceive
Torn by divorce; family values have now deceased
I watched the brightest and the best fall through the cracks
I saw them commit to a lifestyle from which they can never go back
I saw hopeless romantics torn by love and passion
I heard their cries and laments go unanswered
And for their descent they paid the worst price -
A broken heart, an empty spirit, and a series of lonely nights
I saw women and men starved for beauty,
caked in make up and photo-shopped thin
I saw their plastic parts armed with plastic hearts
featured on the evening news
I saw celebrities fall apart on the screen;
Their fame and fortune just a superficial thing
I saw my friends and fellow soldiers in therapy
Making headway into what prevents them from sleep
My generation beats the drum of a broken soul
In awkward unison with their broken hearts
In glorious melody with their unfulfilled potential
Their glory has been stolen
Their futures have been meddled with
and sanity’s presence has been removed
And into the dark, my generation strays;
Impassive and in debt to the hierarchies of society
The bastard, the addict, and the faggot unite
to revel in the waste, the shit, and the spite
To cry, crawl, and make their way
past a sick and sordid morphine parade
Where fools become gods in the eyes
of a sick, withdrawn junky’s screams and sighs
Past the piss-paved streets of gold
that cater to the rich and disparage the rest
With blood-stained breasts and bloodshot eyes
and our cinema-fixed, hasty minds
We hold our tongue along with our hopes
and settle disputes with fabricated anecdotes
To dig ourselves into a deeper grave
from which we may never be saved.

II.
Here lies the pigeonholed generation
Exceedingly exuberant despite its situation
The psych meds won’t work for long;
the anxiety will soon wear away
Prozac, Xanax, and Seroquel will cease to exist
for their means are one in the same
I saw the streets of Los Angeles riddled with saints
But none of them in God’s saving grace
I saw the backstreets of San Francisco
Where my generation roamed without direction
I saw the Lower East Side of Manhattan
Where the queers and poets remained vacant
The forefathers of this nation are no longer Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin
but instead the works of Ginsberg, Burroughs and Kerouac
have become our new national monuments
And the popes and presidents of our generation dissolve
Into the crack addicts and prostitutes of Skid Row
Defeated and reduced to inner city waste;
strangled and smothered by God’s loving embrace
I will both decry and defend my generation
and the generations that came before
And all of the things that they have done
which I overtly abhor
However, underneath all of the implicit transgressions
lies a truth, which we should all revel in:
We are the alcoholics; anonymous and God-fearing
We are the junkies; hungry veins aching for an escape
We are the faggots; stripped away from society
We are the deranged; fed with Lithium and put away
We are the liars; who know no truth but pain
We are the dreamers; who spend their days dreaming in vain
We are the atheists; godless and forgotten
We are the pacifists; prone to passive aggression
We are the depressed; sensitive to suicidal intentions
We are the beat, the battered, and the broken
We were shown no mercy; instead only how to blame
To our dark, sadistic, and twisted minds
you have created the monster you claim us to be
We are one -
and we are beat.