Ghetto Defendant

[Ginsberg]
Starved in metropolis
Hooked on necropolis
Addict of metropolis
Do the worm on the acropolis
Slamdance the cosmopolis
Enlighten the populace

[Verse 1: Strummer]
Hungry darkness of living
Who will thirst in the pit?
(Hooked in necropolis)
She spent a lifetime deciding
How to run from it
(Addicts of metropolis)
Once fate had a witness
And the years seemed like friends
(Girlfriends)
Now her child has a dream
But it begins like it ends

[Ginsberg]
Shot into eternity
Methadone kitty
Iron serenity

[Chorus]
Ghetto defendant
It is heroin pity
Not tear gas nor baton charge
That stops you taking the city

(Strung out committee)
Walled out of the city
Clubbed down from uptown
Sprayed pest from the nest
Run out to barrio town
(The guards are itchy)
Forced to watch at the feast
Then sweep up the night
Flipped pieces of coin
(Broken bottles)
Exchanged for birthright

[Chorus]
Ghetto defendant it is heroin pity
(Strung out committee)
Not tear gas nor baton charge
That stops you taking the city
(Not sitting pretty)
(Grafted in a jiffy)
Not tear gas nor baton charge
That stops you taking the city

The ghetto prince of gutter poets
Was bounced out of the room
(Jean Arthur Rimbaud)
By the bodyguards of greed
For disturbing the tomb
(1873)
His words like flamethrowers
(Paris commune)
Burnt the ghettos in their chests
His face was painted whiter
And he was laid to rest
(Died in Marseille)

Ghetto defendant it is heroin pity
(Buried in Charleville)
Not tear gas nor baton charge
That stops you taking the city
(Shut up in eternity)

[Ginsberg]
Guatemala
Honduras
Poland
100 years war
TV re-run invasion
Death squad Salvador
Afghanistan
Meditation
Old Chinese flu
Kick junk
What else
Can a poor worker do?

[Chorus]
[Ginsberg chanting]