We went where the French were quartered in the late morning. Tight roads, colorful buildings, steel railed balconies draped with colorful beads and spanish moss, restaurants, courtyards, inns, art galleries, salons, bars, old fashioned beggars, soap shops, dog shops, hat shops, dress shops, and more bars. Jazz, zydeco, and booming paint buckets echoed through narrow city block canyons, huge magnolias covered green park squares. A toxic mix of odors combined to produce a smell of basic puke, a smell that could not be ignored or avoided. America's drain, dump your trash in the Mississippi and it'll find its way to New Orleans.
People keep coming down, hustling, looking for big easys, looking for kicks. Cry babies keep moving. Andrew Jackson knew the importance of the town, he recruited natives and Lafitte's pirates to help fight off the Brits after they burned down the White House. In the end, they were too prissy for the swamps, they were no match for the locals. The redcoat survivors were sent back to their little king.
Was good enough for the man in the long black coat over on Soniat Street, he don't care about war. Float your illusions of grandeur and evil eyes back to Europe, all diseased with conceit. What was it you wanted, tell us again, we forgot. We're shooting stars living in a world where mercy walks the planks, ain't no use jiving, ain't no use joking, they all got broken. Ring them bells for the blind and deaf, ring them bells for all of us who are left.