Aurel's laurels

I wrote this a long time ago before I had children. I was in a play written by one of my teachers and we spent a late evening after rehearsal at an older actor's apartment. It was in the early eighties and, as was the fashion then, there was some cocaine at the party. Someone very close to me was addicted to cocaine at the time and after the party I wrote this for him.

From Kilimanjaro to Popocatepetl
Lies a thin passage in the air
A space inside a tube
Within a wire straight and long
The messages which flow there
Are without fear and strong
But they glitter through the night
And leave you ragged far from rest
While higher in the Himalayas
In some cave or quiet retreat
A yellow hat is sleeping
And when he wakes he thinks
Did I dream I was a butterfly
Or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man