Continuing my “Fun a Day” for 2016, a brand new song. “Fun a Day” is maybe a bit of a misnomer in this case, as it’s not really a fun topic, but so it goes.
January 4: “Beggars in the Streets”
I am not an old man, at least I don’t think so yet
But I’ve seen some changes in my time
Driving downtown, I stop at the light, man walks up to my car
Asks me if I can spare a dime
I think about when I was a kid, this was something you didn’t see
Fellow Americans begging in the streets
The rich got richer, and poor, well, you know what happened to them
No line for humanity on a balance sheet
How did we come to have beggars in the streets
Where did we go wrong with the USA?
When I was a kid we didn’t have beggars in the streets
How did we reach that point today?
We gotta thousand empty houses and a thousand homeless folks
Seems we ought be able to work that out
But the banks and the investors, all the ruling class
Say that’s not what the economy is about
Some days I feel like I’m in a Woodie Guthrie song
Some men’ll rob you with a ball point pen
Little crooks they go to jail, big ones just get more rich
Same as it was way back when
One way or another, a change is gonna have to come
We might fix it up or let it all fall down
But even in a disaster, you know, a worst case scenario
Seeds are still gonna grow up from the ground
Life on Earth will still go on, no matter what we monkeys do
And I take some comfort from that fact
But I ain’t givin’ up, I still got hope that we could still make it right
Find a way for everyone to live intact
How did we come to have beggars in the streets
Where did we go wrong with the USA?
When I was a kid we didn’t have beggars in the streets
How did we reach that point today?
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