This Is My Voice

This is my voice
 There are many like it
 But this one if mine
 And its a fine line
 When you try and define the finer points of politics
 Politics being a latin word
 Poly meaning many
 And Tics meaning blood sucking butt lumps
 See, too many live in countries where its
 Bullets instead of ballots
 Where gavels fall like mallets
 When held in the hands of those
 Whose judgements can be bought
 As easily as children can be taught to covet
 And the only ones willing to speak up
 Are forced to live
 So far under the radar
 That the underground is considered above it
 This is for the Ho Chi Mins
 And the Michaels Colins
 For the Marques De Sades
 And the muted gods
 This is my voice
 There are many like it
 But this one is mine
 -- We're not always
 Right, but we've got the right to be wrong
 We're not always free
 So this is just a short story long
 This is my voice
 there are many like it
 but this one is mine
 and this time it's for the sons and daughters
 who watch their mothers and fathers
 drown in shallow waters while
 panning for the "American dream"
 in the polluted creek called the mainstream
 This is for the homeless people
 sleeping on steam vents
 making makeshift tents
 out of cardboard and old trash
 trying to catch 40 winks
 in between the crash of car wrecks
 risking their necks by surviving another day
 so that they can starve
 so that famine can carve their body into a corpse
 before their heart stops beating
 so that men in a boardroom meeting
 can make it harder for them to get welfare, health care,
 it's no wonder some of them pawn off their own wheelchair
 and every time I walk 'em by
 I can't help but feel at fault
 that maybe I didn't search myself hard enough
 for the control alt "s"
 so that I could save the world
 Or at least this little girl
 curled up into a ball
 I've spent most of my life throwing compassion back
 like a fish that's too small
 Gotta cash in my reality checks
 drop her some spare fantasies
 cause I've got three separate degrees
 from different universities,
 but the most valuable thing I ever learned
 was to believe people when they say "Please."
 This is my voice,
 there are many like it,
 but this one is mine.
 ()
 You ever been real,
 been reamed out,
 picked on, put down,
 ever been ever been rowdy at the sound
 when your own heart breaks,
 not to take the time, to take the time
 ever been seen and not heard,
 you ever blurred the lines for those who tried
 to find some way to define what you are,
 as if you were far from them,
 at least at the heart of them its more than a part of them.
 you ever been told you're too young or too old,
 and there's always that line
 when you're willing to walk by,
 and you gotta receive and then beat the deadlines
 so don't try to define us cause this time we' re fine.
 so don't try to define us cause this time we're fine.
 so don't try to define us cause this time we' re fine.
 We're pissed and we're loud and now you know why.
 ()
 Don't tell me there are no heroes
 This is for them, the women and the men.
 For Helen Keller who against all odds found a voice.
 For the choice Veronica Guerin made.
 For Martin Luther King who stayed just long enough
 to share a dream with us.
 This is for that day on the bus for sister Rosa Parks.
 This for the Joan of Arcs who believe
 even in the face of sparks becoming flame.
 The political game that Louis Riel refused to play
 This is for the day the Dalai Lama finally goes home
 For Dr. Jeffrey Wigand who alone stared down big tobacco
 For Nelson Mandela who continues to go the extra mile
 This is for the trial that finally found a man
 guilty of shooting Medger Evers dead.
 This is for everything Malcolm X said,
 remembered by athletes who left the Olympics double-fisted
 For Arthur Miller,
 blacklisted for calling a witch hunt what it was
 For Galileo locked up because he said the earth was round
 For the Two Live crew who found the sound that got them banned in the USA.
 And imagine if we could still hear John Lennon play.
 This is for the someone who stood up today and said, "No!".
 For Edward R. Murrow who shut down McCarthy.
 For Salmon Rushdie, Mahatma Ghandi,
 You, me, this city, this country.
 We will always have a choice.
 When you stand up to be counted.
 Tell the world,
 This is my voice,
 There are many like it,
 but this one is mine