Memorial

Mothers would awake to feed their children

Our brothers would awake to mend their nets and mend their sails

Mothers, mothers would awake to feed their children

Our brothers would awake to mend the nets and sails

They had the boundless light of a new day dawning

And a burning, living, driving will

They had the light of a boundless new day dawning

They had a burning, living, driving will

Meanwhile the old man stood on the top of the hill

Wading through your legislation

Wading, trudging through your debate

About whether or not to send

Another hundred thousand young men and women

Off into the hurricane

No taxation without representation

We will not pay a toll in blood

The old man must sit on the top of the hill

While the young girls usher the playful ghosts down by the creek

Singing they are following golden fish into the marshes reek

The old man should sit on the top of the hill of fifty-eight thousand

Walking, walking above the plain

I am descending six feet underground

You sent me here

Every name, every name upon this wall

You sent me here

Six feet under

Why don't you take a short walk?

Walk out of your oval office

Walk out of the state house

Take a short walk across the lawn

And descend six feet under and read those names

And you're debating, you're still

Debating whether or not to send me here

You're debating, you're debating

Whether or not to send more over there

Six feet under, you really do carry my weight

Bats grazing in the night sky above our houses

Lightning bugs rising higher and high

Bats grazing in the sky, in the night sky above our houses

Lightning bugs rising higher and high

As the sun leaves behind, as the sun leaves behind

This valley, this waking valley song

A memorial

Fall six feet to me under, you really did carry my weight

The earth's success is not made true in our unhappy state

And you still debate, debate, debate

Who is this?

A voice who isn't

A voice comes quick and stays on

It is this waking valley song

Archaic and bent with time

It is his memory, it is his memory