Come Out Fighting Genghis Smith

The social game we live in is based on possession
And if you think you own a body then you're playing
But if you think you own anything you must be mad
And if you think that you're owned - well you're raving
So come on now my friends let us kneel and pray
Let us stick all our hands tight together
For I want to tell you about your God
Who brings you your life's possessions and disaster
Now if he was inconceivable then how can he exist?
When that word has the same meaning as the word 'nothing'?
And he who thinks he knows what the word 'nothing' means
Has only his own excuse for an answer
And if he is conceivable he must be just like us
For he must have a conceivable being
And if he's got being he must have life
And if he's living he must also be dying

But he was the classroom at Aberfan
He was the teachers and the little children
And he was all the mud that covered them
He was the sky, the school, the whole damn mountain
But it makes me sick to have to sing you all this
When I know that when you were born you had it
Well society might buy its gods and power
But in its present state, well it's never gonna buy anything honest

Me and my friends, tell you what we're gonna do
It's really no secret now that we are telling you
We're collecting the Autumn leaves
Taking them home to the coal-fire scenes
And spending the snow-time painting them green
Ready for you all to see again in the Springtime

And if you think that either of us is right or wrong
Then there's only one thing we do have in common
We're both fighting for the very same breath
For very, very different reasons

Well the sky is blue and the day is long
And you ask me what there's left to believe in
Well, I say just hold what you feel in all your eyes
And give a big, broad smile to the world your passing
And if you think you're a 'Pop-star' you can come and laugh at me
And you can call me all the shades of half-wit sceptic
But if you're no nearer now to just being you
Then both of us might just as well forget it

In this song I've said "I" about ten times
On the record you could count many others
But I don't need wealth and I don't want fame
And I'll never need to count on my brothers
And if you still think that either of us is right or wrong
Then there's only one thing we do have in common
Well, we both happen to be fighting for the very same breath
What did you say were your reasons?

So me and my friends - tell you what we're gonna do
It's really no secret now that we are telling you
We're collecting the falling dreams
Taking them home to the coal-fire scenes
And spending the snow-time painting them green
Ready for you all to see again in the Springtime

Well Auntie Sally's coming back to life yesterday
And she's gonna ask me what the hell it is I'm singing
Well I tell you, it's an unimpressive song
Really, but it's fifty one ages long
But you know, well you know Jack
I guess I'm not the only one who's singing

Well, I'm sorry I've not written before now, Jack
You know... but that's it, man
There's something here anyway that I think you'll like-
Dig this lot:

Ghengis Smith was a silly old fool and a silly old fool was he
He mauled for his dough and he bawled for his god
And he called for his little cup of tea
"Ooh Mum", he said. "Does God go to bed?
Or is he a rich man too?"
She said, "In a minute, my son
I'll box your bloody ears for you"

"What do you mean
I'm a terrible queen?
I'll have you know your Dad
If he hadn't have died of 'athlete's brain'
Would have driven you twice as mad"

Old Ghengis Smith was not deterred
He bought himself a gun...

"I've got one eye on God", he said
"But that ain't nothing, man
It's the other mother
It's focussed on some good clean gun fun"

The gun fun escalated and the game just wasn't fun
As mother wept onto assorted pieces of her son
But never mind he left his child (we've got his son)
We'll bring him up the same
And he can die too, then like a man, yes in the very next blood-game

And so the game is played out on the sinking Wigan pier
With brass bands round the gravestones so that no one can quite hear
The prophets and the gentle people's feelings that are lost
Inside the ringing cauldron of the crashing holocaust

Farewell to you, Dear Ghengis Smith, I'd help you if I could
But there's nothing I could have told you that you'd have understood
And there's nothing I could have told you that would have done you any good
And "Hey there, is there much more room down there? All I can see is mud