[ blues ]
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In a hole outside the inn
Strung up on the cross
You know, we didn't give a damn
Now he lives out in the city
On the lower east side
Sleeps in the park an' alley
Any place, he can hide
He's cold, his stomach's empty
And his teeth are rottin' out
His face is full'a sorrow
Ya know, his heart is full'a doubt
His clothes are old and torn
And his eyes are dull with pain
But he's not half as dirty
As your hearts of blind insane
Sunday mornin' you carry bibles
Fill your pews with well-fed souls
Dress your windows up in stain-glass
An' drop bread in your silver bowls
You sing "peace on earth"
But you support men of war
Vote for those who help the rich
And screw the sick and poor
Oh beautiful for spacious skies
For amber waves of grain
Your poor and wretched millions
Have become an open shame
Beneath your gilded steeple
Where they beg for crusts of bread
Cry old women and helpless children
With no place to lay their head
Listen up America
Better listen up real good
Try an' understand the reason why
The nails went in the wood
Reach out a hand to help the poor
Reach out a hand to help the sick
Some father's lookin' on an' they say
He carries a mighty stick
Born along time ago
In a hole outside the inn
Strung up on the cross
Ya know, we didn't give a damn
Now he lives out in the city
On the lower east side
Sleeps in the park and alley
Any place, he can hide
Ya know, Sodom learned the hard way
Ain't no place we can hide
Listen up America. . .
Better listen up America. . .
Umm ummmm, better listen up America. . . * ** ***
U.S. Homeless Information
U.S. Native Poverty Information
U.S. Homeless Veterans Information
National Coalition For The Homeless
National Law Center On Homelessness and Poverty
What manner of nation would use half of the world's resources, harbor much of the world's wealth, contain a large percentageof the world's educated elite, continue to build some of the world's most expensive (and entirely worthless) religious edifices, provide unwarranted tax breaks for the extremely wealthy top 1% of the population and an entertainment industry which routinely spends over one hundred million dollars to create meaningless motion picture drivel, claim to have the preferred form of government for the entire planet and to stand for truth and justice. . . and yet look the other way as impoverished homeless war veterans, senior citizen's and children are forced to sleep in cardboard boxes, in back alleyways, under bridges, in city parks and on city sidewalks? Will the country which Samuel Clemens referred to as the "land of bibles" go down in history as the one nation beyond all others, that devolved into an utter profane insult to the Creator of the universe?
*FootNote: Inspired by "Tramp On The Street" by Grady & Hazel Cole and "Greenwood" by Peter Yarrow, as performed by King David's beloved friends, Peter Yarrow, Noel Paul Stookey & Mary Travers.
**FootNote II: "Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy." Ezekiel 16:49. See also Fleeing Sodom for more details.
***FootNote II: Many modern intellectuals and liberal activists do not believe that the Creator will come down hard on a nation that does not make a concerted effort to help the sick and poor. People who vainly imagine that there is no Creator in control who does to nations as they do unto their own are even more insane than the current Bush Junior administration and the Christian Coalition combined (good luck).
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