Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon,
The handmade blade, the child's balloon,
Eclipses both the sun and moon –
To understand you know too soon there is no sense in trying.
Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
As suicide remarks are torn –
From the fool's gold mouthpiece, the hollow horn
Plays wasted words, proves to warn
That he not busy being born is a-busy dying.
Temptation's page a-flies out the door,
You follow, find yourself at war,
Watch waterfalls of pity roar,
Feel to moan, but unlike before
You discover that you'd just be one more person crying.
So, don't fear if you hear
That foreign sound in your ear,
It's alright, ma, I'm only sighing.
Some warn victory, some downfall,
Private reasons – great or small –
Can be seen in the eyes of those that call
To make all that should be killed to crawl
While others say, "Don't hate nothing at all except hatred."
Disillusioned words like a-bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark,
Make everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark –
Easy to see without looking too far not much is really sacred.
While preachers preach of evil fates,
Teachers teach that knowledge waits,
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates,
Goodness hides behind its gates,
But even the president of the United States sometimes must have to stand naked.
And, though the rules of the road have been lodged,
It's people's games you got to dodge,
But it's alright, ma, I can make it.
Advertising signs that con
You into thinking you're the one
That can do what's a-never been done,
That can win what's a-never been won –
Meantime life outside goes on all around you.
You lose yourself, you reappear,
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear,
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling, distant voice, unclear,
Startles your sleeping ears to hear someone thinks they really found you.
A question in your nerves is lit,
Yet you know there is a-no answer fit
To satisfy, ensure you not to quit,
Keep it in your mind and not forget
That it is not he or she or them or it that you belong to.
And, though the masters make the rules
For the wise men and the fools,
I got nothing, ma, to live up to.
Old-lady judges watch people in pairs,
Limited in sex they dare
To push fake morals, insult, and stare,
Money doesn't talk, it swears,
Obscenity – who really cares? – propaganda all is phony.
While them that defend what they cannot see
With a killer's pride, security,
It blows their minds most bitterly,
For them that think death's honesty
Won't fall upon 'em naturally, life sometimes must get lonely.
My eyes collide head-on with stuffed
Graveyards, false goals, I scuff
At pettiness, which plays so rough,
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs,
Kick my legs to crash it off,
Say, "Alright, I've had enough, what else can you show me?"
And, if my thought-dreams could be seen,
They'd probably put my head in a guillotine,
But it's alright, ma, it's life and life only.