Where are you going and where have you been?
You've learned nothing at all from all that you've seen
You don't care who you hurt, you don't know what love means
Ain't it funny how life never is as it seems?

You've been hurt and now you ignore the pain
So many times you think you're going insane
There's no way to stop it now, no end to your game
And one day you'll know there's no one else you can blame

With all of your lies and the way that you flew
It's hard to believe you're the girl that I knew
With the life that you've led and with all you've been through
Did you ever wonder what'll become of you?

My fine feathered lover, watch out, beware
Your flight path is less a circle than a square
You've turned all the sharpest corners and cut them all clean
Tell me, where are you going and where have you been?

You used to be such an innocent girl
Your beauty once shined like the whitest of pearls
You love to get sun-tanned while laying on the lawn
But now it is raining and your color's all gone

You'll find yourself living out in the street
Then a pimp will find you and you'll kiss his feet
He'll use you and sell you till you're no good anymore
Then you'll realize what you've become is a whore

Where are you going? I've seen where you've been
Now you've spread your legs and let them all in
Do you know what you're doing? I think it's a sin
But you'll keep on doing it again and again

You dance around like a sweet high class queen
You're sleeping habits are completely obscene
Burning your sheets has become a daily routine
I wonder where you're going, I've seen where you've been

04/16/1984

Author's Note: �Where Are You Going? I've Seen Where You've Been!� was formed from a conglomeration of inspirations. To begin with, my girlfriend sent me a letter on the day of my mid-term exams at college, telling me she was leaving me for another guy, who she later left for a girl. Around that time, in Literature class, we had read the short story, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", by Joyce Carol Oats, which she said had been inspired by the song "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue", by Bob Dylan. I took some inspiration from both and also Dylan's "Like A Rolling Stone", combined with my anger and wrote the poem. After failing my exams that day I started cutting classes and losing all interest in college and life in general. By the end of the year my grades and attendance made my decision to drop out of college mute, as I was given the boot without having to so much as tell anyone I wasn�t planning to return. The one class I kept going to until the end of the semester was English, however. It�s funny that the one class I hated throughout my school years would become the one I loved in college. I even managed to fail English in my senior year in high school and had to attend Summer School to get my diploma, which is funnier still because I now work as a Teacher�s Aide in English in the very same high school I failed the class in. You just never know where you are going, even if you�ve already been there.

http://astore.amazon.com/seedsandweeds-20

Posted on 09/27/2005
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