when the music's over

you cringe
as they romanticize
the sixties
in books and movies,
make it all fun and happy.
peace and love.
hardly.
you remember dead boys,
boys chopped
in two.
the sharp swords
of needles slipping
into veins.
the acid trips
making birds out of children
as they dropped from the tops
of buildings.
you watched your father
leave.
your mother, with a broken arm
taken against her will
to Saint E's.
and yet you learned all
the music, what else
was there to do?