In the summer that my son was born
In the same unchanging town that fathered me
I retraced many steps trying to fit my own footsteps
Is it the truth perhaps there is no return

Political lies, political promises
This shadow everywhere, the sense of powerlessness
And you and I left stumbling in their blindness
The blindness of Wall Street, Moscow, and White Hall

How many miles I walked by the union canal
Thinking of the hands that made it, the hands of the navies
Thinking of the patient horses that pulled along the barges
Whose tow ropes have rubbed groves on the pillars of the bridges
And I thought this "What rubs you rubs me"

Political lies, political promises
This shadow everywhere, the sense of powerlessness
And you and I left waiting in the history
A history of mystery, a history of betrayal

All along the banks of the union canal
I walked in the flaming sunset of a summer's evening
Scottish skin head, glue head, Scottish flag, the tune in his head
Looks at the sky and asks me "What does it mean?"

Political lies, political promises
This shadow everywhere, the sense of powerlessness
And you and I left basking in the anguish
The anguish of those we have failed to hear

In the night I listen to my own darkness
I think being born and dying have the same tax bases
I think about the signature of God on the prison
And about following sides and becoming lost again

Political lies, political promises
This shadow everywhere, the sense of powerlessness
And you and I left with the same old question
The sheer unspeakable strangeness of being here at all