You find as a writer that there are certain spots on the planet where you write better than others, and I believe in that. And New Orleans is one of them.

I feel like goin' surfing in a hurricane / I feel like makin' love in the pouring rain / I ain't afraid of dying / I don't need to explain / I feel like goin' surfing in a hurricane

So I sit on a bench in Jackson Square / I drink my wine and I breathe the midnight air / Tomorrow I'll just hit the street and bum another dime / Cause there's nothing soft about hard times

Had to go 'cause I could see I wasn't meant for poverty / The family ties were broken soon and I went off to find the moon

The muscles that controlled my smile were rarely ever used / Cause there's nothing soft about hard times

We never knew anything groovy / A dime meant bread and not a movie

Every day held a new surprise / I watched the hunger burning in my sister's eyes / The paste-board shack we called home / Would haunt me in my dreams / Cause there's nothing soft about hard times

Found myself a matchbook / Beside some hotel bed / Opened it up and looked inside / And this is what it said / Get on back to school.

Ain't no registration / Ain't no student loan / You may not learn to read or write / But you will surely learn to roll dem bones / Get on back to school.

There are relics from Apollo trips / When the earthmen came to play / And a hammock from a distant star / Out in the Milky Way.