The folks all around the world have been fighting now for a hundred centuries to all be union & all be free, & I sing the songs that tell you about that... I sing songs that tell you who the racketeers are & how they rob you & how they work & how they would like to keep you as their slave... I just want to be known as the man who told you what you already knew.
Woody Guthrie
I've tried to make poems that might be useful to people. If you find any you can use, please feel free. If you just find part of one, use that part & throw the rest away. Change any lines you want. Add others. It's okay with me. If you change one a whole lot, it'll be your poem as much as mine. If you share it with a friend & that friend asks who wrote it, say both of us; if anybody else asks, say anonymous.
Not John
1st WALL: We Build Houses
We build houses, the banks own them;we build machines, the bosses own them;
we try to build our lives, the state owns them,
& the bosses & the bankers own the state.
But workingpeople are dreaming dreams again.
The sky is dark with birds.
2nd WALL: Mr.Businessman
Mr.Businessman: we may slave for you,but as we slave we're thinking.
We don't need you, we can run things ourselves,
for each other's needs, not your profit.
We know you are afraid of us.
We are an ocean, we are a storm.
3rd WALL: We Work Ten Dollars Worth
We work ten dollars worth, the boss grabs five,the state steals two: hunger, death,
smoldering Hanoi rubble:
they pervert our work into misery & destruction.
To perpetuate their cheating us.
The unborn children laugh & cry.
4th WALL: They Claim The Ground I Walk
They claim the ground I walk, thehouse I live in, the machines I
work at, the goods I produce;
they claim two thousand
years of law behind them &
ten thousand hired men with
guns to back them up & claim
those guns defend their
freedom which they claim is
my freedom too, freedom to
sell them my labor, pay them
my rent, buy back the goods
I've produced, freedom to
scheme to set myself up
like them & exploit fools like
me.
But who am I to
speak?
Just one poor workingman.
And the workers, they claim,
are
content.
5th WALL: A Vast Network Of Machinery
A vast network of machinery,devised & built by us, capable
of assuring everyone's survival:
a few bosses control
it: our seas
smell of death, our
cities of hunger;
our schools & jobs
are prisons of despair; our
police are men they own,
our leaders men they choose:
business is bloated,
survival is scarce.
CRIMINALS DICTATE
THE TERMS OF OUR
LlVES: THE ONLY WAY
TO FREE OURSELVES
IS TO UNITE.
6th WALL: HEY KIDS
HEY KIDSthe businessmen rule over us.
they steal all the money, buy the teachers,
politicians & cops.
they trick us into being slaves,
force us into fighting wars
so they can ransack the world
for their personal hordes.
TELL YOUR FRIENDS
WE ARE GATHERING
LIKE WIND
THIS IS OUR PLANET
THIS IS OUR BLOCK
7th WALL: Dispossessed From Land
Dispossessed from land, resources,control of our lives, dispossessed
by businessmen:
we were born that way, our children
are being born that way.
THEY'VE STOLEN
OUR FACTORIES OUR
FARMS OUR
GOVERNMENT BUT
THEY CAN'T STEAL
OUR ANGER
We are at war to confiscate back our world.
8th WALL: Our Lives Are At The Whim
Our lives are at the whimof landlords & bosses:
rents & prices up, wages down, no jobs:
they try to keep us at each others'
throats to just survive.
The night is dark, yes.
But there's many of us
& we're getting ready.
Soon the moon will rise.
9th WALL: When You Can't Stand
When you can't standbeing cheated & pushed around
by your boss another minute,
remember:
in this system
all jobs are like that.
you're "lucky"
to even have one.
They keep the money scarce & the jobs few;
somewhere they got a file on me & you.
THE BOSSES ARE THE
MOB ARE IN POWER
We are chained together.
10th WALL: A Battle, Sometimes Raging
A battle, sometimes raging,sometimes almost invisible,
in every clothes store, bank,
every supermarket aisle:
this is class war.
We'd like to avoid it, but there's no way&emdash;
as long as business owns the law,
we're poorer every day.
Still, we'll get what we need, one way or another.
WE ARE EACH
OTHERS'
WEAPONS.
11th WALL: Politicians, Bosses
Politicians, bosses, landlords,leeches bleeding us as they bled
our parents, as they have plans for our kids .
THE PEOPLE ACT TO STOP THEM
they fire, evict us
WE ACT AGAIN AGAIN
they order us beaten jailed murdered
WE ORGANIZE, ACT
ACT AGAIN AGAIN
The leeches are not the only ones with plans.
12th WALL: Broken Shovel
Broken shovel in the sand,shadows on the slide.
A spiderweb sways between swings.
Today the children stagger home,
disposable surplus of your poisoned war,
eyeless, legless, flesh ripped & sewn.
The grass screams.
Businessman, your game is over.
We're back, full grown, with guns beneath
our soldiers' rags, & are we ever
wise to you.
13th WALL: They Try To Blur
They try to blurour children's minds with lies, tame
their minds with fear:
they claim to act in our name.
From schoolyard line to battle line
to unemployment line they
march us:
they claim to act in our interest in our name.
THE BEAST IS SLIPPERY -
MANY HEADS & CLAWS, MANY MASKS.
We cannot let ourselves be fooled again.
IT'S TIME WE
ACT IN OUR OWN NAME.
14th WALL: Businessmen Create Our Poverty
Businessmen create our poverty& perpetuate it, then tell us we're poor
'cause we're stupid or lazy,
Businessmen steal our every
technologic advance & hand us back
unemployment & war,
Businessmen structure fear into our lives to
control us, to cheat us of our equal shares
in this our great grandchildren's earth:
may their violence return to them
like haunting dreams (even now
they are afraid to walk the streets, even
now they are afraid to fall asleep); may
their jail terms be as long
as their bank balances.
15th WALL: When Our Blood Begins To Age
When our blood begins to age,our muscles slow, our energy retreats
like sap from snow-crisp branches, when
life should begin to mellow:
INTO THE GARBAGE HEAP
expended with, each of us, for
we'll no longer be useful enough
to them, replaced at the office
or machine with fresher, more
profitable flesh.
Then go sit in the park, nothing
in your pocket, or stay home & watch TV
if you haven't hocked it.
The old know the truth: When we're young
they drain our lives into money; when
we're old they help us to get dead.
America is a slaughterhouse.
One by one we're expendable to them.
But together, fighting back
while we've still strength,
we can take care of each other
& expend with them.
16th WALL: We Are A Wounded Mind
We are a wounded mind,festering, struggling to heal...
"Got to be losers
'cause there's winners,
somebody's got to be boss:
natural selection,"
(the financiers say), "fittest on top."
& you better believe it, kid, &
that's the way it's going to stay, so
keep your ass moving & your mouth shut.
You been lucky so far:
they're still grinning at you they could
come for you tonight!
CLASS STATE IS
POLICE STATE
... a festering wound must be reopened
if it is to heal.
17th WALL: In America
In America there's three classes(or so they teach in school): a few rich,
the middle class,
and a few poor;
the "middle class" includes most of us, they say,
and we're\ in control
SUCH MUDDLE IS DESIGNED
TO FRAGMENT US AND SMOKESCREEN
OUR MINDS, DETACH OUR WORDS
FROM WHAT WE SEE, OUR FEELINGS
FROM WHAT WE FEEL.
Our grandchildren will admit
to one another that
so many of us shouted so loud that we were
"free" because we were afraid to
face our slavery.
Money and property rule the people.
18th WALL: Sometimes/ the Pain
Sometimes/ the pain/of being/ in this prison/
with you . . .
(the warden's owned by bankers,
our bosses are our guards;
property & money are the walls
& the bars.
Yet even now they're brawling
among themselves, over which
should own our days & nights
& which should rule the mountains & stars.
WE MUST KEEP
STRONG & WAIT & WATCH THE
TOWERS
Soon we will gather in the prison yard.
19th WALL: EITHER YOU GOT A JOB
EITHER YOU GOT A JOB OR YOUGOT A HUSTLE. IF YOU'RE A
WORKER, MAN YOU GOT A JOB; IF YOU'RE
A BOSS, MAN
YOU GOT A HUSTLE.
How come we got to work for hustlers,
how come they're directing the show?
Why can't
I work for you & you for me,
share what we have, be each other's security?
Did God arrange things like this?
Nature's law, human nature?
Is our collective mind diseased
projecting horrible dreams?
Or am I here alone in my strange creation?
Still, consciousness has laws of its own.
awakening will begin in unbearable
oppression, when death is overcome
power will flow, renewal
(if not for their guns our parents our
grandparents would have kicked them
out long ago).
DAWN.
LIGHTNING FROM BELOW
20th WALL: Crooks Ruling
Crooks ruling our nation,using inflation
to steal next year's pay hike
& years of our savings!
GENERAL STRIKE!
21st WALL: Poor Blacks
Poor blacks, browns and whitescompeting for the same lousy jobs
that aren't even there:
nobody getting a fair share.
So whiteman shoves brown
& brownman shoves back;
blackwoman blamed
whitewoman attacked:
huge corporate profits,
poverty biting.
They try to keep us fighting
for crumbs
to try to keep us from
uniting.
22nd WALL:
Moving quietly at first, likeplants in our coming
together. Fuscia buds un-
fold into clouds of
moths. Struggling toward
transformation. Moths
burst into flame. We will
throw open all the doors
and windows, sweep a thousand
years of rubbish
into the ocean. What has
never been seen
before, which way
is the rain?
Billboard: Bosses Economy Collapsing
Bosses economy collapsing!We don't need them;
survival means seizing our freedom!
We have nothing but each other.
Copyright © 1975, 1997 by John Curl. All Rights Reserved.
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