The Losing Side

From common grief to Bristol up in flames We came here begging justice and instead we got the blame For peace disturbed out on the streets tonight And watching on the BBC you know something's not right When mourners come with candles and with flowers Are wrestled three-on-one and pinned down by the state's full powers This is their world and these have been the rules But we have come to break it down with bloody fingernails for tools This threat of violence, this tightrope wire We can no longer bear it, we're all too fucking tired No minute's silence, we will sing higher Don't tell us to light a candle when we have come to start a fire And if I spend my life on the losing side You can lay me down knowing that I tried There's a better world and on a quiet day When I hold my breath I can hear her say "She's on her way" "She's on her way" Safe at home, you watch it on TV And never think that one day you could be the enemy That you might one day be under attack From all that should protect you hoping someone has your back The history books are screaming from the shelves That no government who outlaws speaking to defend ourselves Has good things planned, a storm ahead I see And not one of us will bear it without solidarity Oh I see trouble, all my days This ailing failing world sends signs of fire and flood and plague But from the rubble, from the razed The mightiest cathedral from these ashes we will raise And if I spend my life on the losing side You can lay me down knowing that I tried There's a better world and on a quiet day When I hold my breath I can hear her say "Take heart my sisters" "This fire will never die" "Take heart my comrades" "No one left behind" And if I spend my life on the losing side You can lay me down knowing that I tried There's a better world and on a quiet day When I hold my breath I can hear her say That if I spend my life on the losing side ("Take heart my sisters") You can lay me down knowing that I tried ("This fire will never die") There's a better world and on a quiet day ("Take heart my comrades") When I hold my breath I can hear her say ("No one left behind") That if I spend my life on the losing side You can lay me down knowing that I tried There's a better world and on a quiet day When I hold my breath I can hear her say "She's on her way"