Beneath our bruised and blistered feet
there comes a strange unearthly beat,
a pulse beneath our sad complaints
about how things were what they ain't
how everything has gone to hell
and how we got here none can tell
how kids ain't got no **** respect
how there's no rule they won't reject
and folks ain't safe now in their beds;
this beat continues, fractures, spreads
adds rhythms to the observation
that mankind's headed for damnation
the whole confounded human race
is ragged, cracked, a sad disgrace
(not like when we were being raised
our folks knew better, heav'n be praised
and we had boundaries, and grit,
and cross those lines and you'd get hit!)
And maybe we would stop lamenting
but this relentless pulse is venting
every bitter ball of bile
and tapping, tapping all the while
and speeding up in frenzied glee
until we all can plainly see
that, spinning in a beat-bound haze
we're longing for the GOOD OLD DAYS!
When Earth was young and pure and clean
and folks were kind, not cold and mean
and guided by self interest -
we used to see them at their best!
And click and tap and snap and clatter
comes rising from the mud and litter
And we're so caught in this discourse
we have no time to seek its source.
But down and down, beneath the soil
encased in bedrock black as oil
grinning to a tune they know,
the rhythm section's all a-glow
the skeletons of murdered daughters
of babies born and swiftly slaughtered
vagabonds and martyrs who
were butchered for a point of view
and soldiers, soldiers, cold battalions
knocked by maces off their stallions
to die dishonoured and forgotten
and lie until their bones were rotten
lost amongst the brittle league
of those who toppled to the plague
They're all awake and keeping time
to our pathetic little rhyme
and clacking carpals and phalanges
grind the message: "nothing changes!"
and not one ragged scrap of bone,
no semi-fossil all alone
can summon any memory
of when things were how they should be

So maybe I will stop the dance
and note the happy circumstance
that I am safe and well and free
I like my friends and they like me
and while injustice still exists
I'm not about to slit my wrists
No-one makes a bright tomorrow
by gazing backwards filled with sorrow
and here and now, I do aver -
I'm glad things aren't the way they were.