STUDIO 54

God made the bucolic country

But the devil made the town

And was influential in creating Studio 54

Where some heavy shit was always going down.

Even Sodom and Gomorrah

Synonymous with all kinds of vice,

And infernos of wicked delight,

Was guaranteed a run for its money

In Manhattan’s sleazy parlour of the night

Inside this depraved cathedral

of mashed, entangled bodies,

Female cowboys consorted with defrocked nuns,

And male ballerinas dressed as randy swans

Or lady Godiva frolicked on a white horse

And the altar-piece was a glittering neon sign

Depicting the Man in the Moon snorting cocaine or worse.

Ten percent were lesbian or transvestite

Twenty percent gay men, pumped up and popper-ed

The rest celebrities, celebrated for their bad behaviour

More than any talent they had to offer.

All came to worship at this altar of sleaze

Where they could drink, dance, drug themselves

And public sex was a jolly good wheeze

The right to seek happiness

Was pursued with a frenzy that was benighted

And Andy Warhol took pictures that he later recycled.