THE MAN WHO WAS A BOY
I am the man who was the boy who dared to laugh aloud
To see a naked emperor parade before the crowd
And when the people fled in fear and I stood there alone
His soldiers dragged me off to jail and burned my father’s home
Now every night he visits me as I lie locked in his cage
And in a black and scarlet uniform he’s splendidly arrayed
Again I learn the lesson that my youth and freedom cost
That he who laughs the loudest is the one who laughs the last
I am the man who was the boy who heard a piper play
On the cobbled streets of Hamelin on a long lost summer day
And I watched my young companions vanish swiftly as the wind
While hampered by my crutches, I limped along behind
Out to that magic mountain with its portals opened wide
Where no doubt nor no uncertainty could ever fit inside
And as I watched that wondrous place turned into solid stone
The music and my friends were gone and I stood there alone.
I am the man who was the boy who heard a saviour say
Let’s bear out swords to ploughshares and turn our hate away
And I spoke all night with Peter –that big man home from the sea
Who seemed so lost and out of place on the streets of Galilee
Remembering a Friday on a bleak and windswept hill
Where a cross stood as a monument to the dreams the priests had killed
And after it was over |I went crying in the rain
For Judas was a friend of mine before the soldiers came.
I am the man who was the boy who walked the crooked mile
And spent the crooked sixpence like it was going out of style
And with black and bitter purpose played crooked cat and mouse
And slept with pimps and parasites in their little crooked house.