Postcard Poverty

Aiming up and down Pointing high and low Digital camera shooting up the ghetto They want snapshot sadness for the slideshow And to find it he's willing to go Trenchtown by day, Cite Soleil by night Down in the Beetham by the burst tire light With a wide-angle lens to catch every sight Before he has to rush To catch his flight Snap, snap, getting high off the gap Between the have and the want, between the Need and lack Between the dirt and decay and the world Waiting dey At the end of his holiday He's looking for postcard poverty He did not pay so much to see The same things he can see away The things that he sees every day He's looking for postcard poverty A little change of scenery He does not want to be the same As the folks he knows away Running up and down Looking to and fro For the cantina seen on the travel show Gives the barman an extra peso Backdrop, group shot, 'cause he wants all to know That he's down with the brothers in the barrio He's down with the brothers and not just a gringo With time to kill and money to spend Come to slum down in the tenement Because he feels he's one of a kind A Vasco de Gama looking for the first time At a land unknown to his homebound friends That only he can explain to them Beyond the walls, way off the beaten path To find the wood mask that she's got to have Finds the vendor, says she adores his craft Then tries to get the man to cut his price in half A war or words and then a deal is made A dollar saved just to tell how brave She was to bargain down an old man with a blade To haggle like a native and then to get her way Now the mask stares down from the wall Mouth open wide to announce to all How she once went down to the depths of hell For a souvenir and a story to tell