It was that one freezing night

In January
An invalid month
An in-between month

We were driving to a party of a friend of a friend
On the other side of the city
We drove further from the lights that we knew
And the terrain so easily photographed
Into the bleak streets

With tiny industrial buildings
And flickering lights from abandoned convenience stores
And flickering lights from half burned cigarettes
Shadows being thrown
No life
Low lives
The invalid blocks
The in-between blocks

Who inhabits these beautiful ruins
The side of town that no brochures care to advertise
Come out so we can see you
Come out and reawaken the bones of the city you built

The breath of liquor from that bar
Can be the breath of fresh air from the LA mountains
The fluorescent lights from your 7/ll
Can be the fluorescent lights from the Hollywood Sign

You may be unseen to a foreign eye
Who is looking to capture the glamour of a town so plastic
But with each crack in the concrete you capture the hard reality
Of this City

The invalid people
The in-between people
Are really right in the center of this backwards place