Work

What you do as work, with your hands,
Matters,
As the sun goes round and round
The sky.

Whether you wash the panes of glass

Of the rich on a ladder,
As the sun goes round and round
The sky.

Whether you mix poisons in glass

In time to be home for dinner,
Or build a bomb for a bigger blast,
And leave church a pardoned sinner.

Whether you bake the bread millions eat

To live,
As the sun goes round and round
The sky.

Whether you plot the crimes you ask
The world forgive,

As the sun goes round and round

The sky.

Whether you know or not,

Workers sit in a faraway land

In a circle working by hand
Making things worth nothing in gold.

Yet the things will still be sold

Amongst each other,

Bringing joy to friend and brother.  

When the sun shall cross the sky no more

You shall be remembered far, far more

By the way you put your hands to work.

And if your fingers knew no dirt,

Pray that they opened many doors.

 

 

Red Glare

The children were led,
on a bright summer day,
to the front of the school to sing.

The flag had been raised and voices were raised
in gleeful adulation.
The children then learned it took courage to turn
a village into a nation.

And the years, they were long.
Now, just snatches of song
haunt the children, now men,
in the place they were sent
to burn.

Stern was the glare of the men as they stared
at the village in conflagration,
at the bodies of strangers who could not be spared;
a danger they were to our nation.

And the rocket's red glare,
the bombs bursting in air,
gave proof through the night
that our flag was still there.

The clouds of smoke from the barbecue fire
provide, from the glare of the sun,
some relief.
The old soldier stared at his plate, now bare,
and tried to shake his grief.

As the clouds shield eyes from sun,
So do lies shield minds from truth.
But to ears that hear cries in the burning
no help can be found by turning
to the lies in the songs of youth.