The Naked Truth

Like most of the other boys my age I wanted a holster and gun
I’d seen all those western movies it looked like it could be fun
The cowboys would capture a savage a red skinned devil from the plains
Who was hell bent on killing the white folk
So they were monsters to me and my friends

Of course we were only children we could not relate to these men
We were raised on a diet of ignorance that started from way back when
Stories were brought back from the new world of beasts with arrows and bows
Men with hair past their shoulders screaming with paint on their faces and toes

But it wasn’t Crazy Horse who wrote the history books was it
It wasn’t Sitting Bull or any of them at all
It was crafted by those who stood on the toes of solution
They had to have it all

It was hard to see the beauty but now it’s all clear to me
At peace with the earth and it’s treasures is the ideal way to be
With the knowledge and the skill of medicine and the wisdom of how to sustain
The balance and such profound perfection
At one with the sun and the rain

But slowly it slipped through their fingers their whole lives scattered like dust
The demise of the ideal had started there was no more mercy or trust
They put up a valiant struggle to keep their homes and their ways
To be free of fear and oppression to be themselves to live out their days

But they hounded them down ‘till there wasn’t a town to live in
They hounded them down ‘till they were left with nothing at all
Promised sanctuary received insanity from them
They had to have it all

They talked to the dead at the ghost dance a chance to break from tyranny
Four hundred men woman and children were slaughtered at wounded knee
I once rode into Nashville on a horse made of steel
It took me through to Memphis for less than the price of a meal
I looked in on an Indian museum a few huts souvenirs and sand
Is this all there is to remember of the people who were butchered for land

And I share in the shame I feel partly to blame for their action
We’ve done it everywhere who do we think we are
I’ve no paint on my face but we’re the craziest race on reflection
We have to have it all