“Along this street of loss and love, I drift
from coffee to coffee, wondering what to do
with my life. Should I throw in my lot
with this brotherhood of dropouts and don
the badge of peace? Should I put the brakes on
and take the absolutes of family and work
for a saving grace? Is it wise to reject
the nimbus of the nine-to-five man, and go on
blundering in a dense cloud of solitude, earthed
to a poetry earthed to the purity of need?”

— Boey Kim Cheng, “Flowers Flagging on Haight-Ashbury”