Verse The Fifty-Fourth

It was thirty minutes before the present, and Katryn Norse was absent-mindedly humming Danzig's Mother and then, not knowing any better, singing We Are 138, thinking he had immortalized it on his own.

Joe was singing the fifty-fourth verse.

"This here is verse nummer vier-und-fünfzig
And it hypnotizes you, makes you think of Danzig
Even if you've never heard of him before
Suddenly you'll be a hummin' Danzig's whore
And it doesn't matter if you're drunk or sober
Oh when I whistle Dixie baby you'll roll over!

You see...
You just ain't allowed to hear what I'm now gonna say
And yet I feel the nee-eed to sing it anyway:
Oh baby I'm just a boy who's come unstuck in time
Tomorrow to childhood, I turn on a dime
Some people say that I'm just crazy or ly'n'
(Sotto voce: Like you. Bitch. And your dumb husband too. You're lucky I like you guys or I'd... I'd... sing nasty things about you. Or something.)
That I know very well I stick in one timeline. Like them. Like you. Like suuu-perglue.

Buuuuut...
I just can't explain the things that I feel
In the end I don't care if it's crazy or real
Maybe it's just a movie with a rickety reel
Maybe it's like a slant rhyme, running off bull
You wouldn't snicker behind my back
If you felt what I felt in that dream parking lot
And if your subconscious mind while hearing these lines
Says "he's not too consistent with reason or rhyme"
That's cuz you didn't hear what I ate and felt
In death's giant dream par-king, lot!"

"Hey Joe, I dozed off there a moment, just when I was getting into it!" Katryn tittered calculatedly. "What are we up to?"

"Oh, I just did the Fifty-Fifth Verse. Here, let me play it again."