Eric Bogle - Mirrors lyrics

rate me

Children are born with trust in their eyes

it's the first thing that we betray

Children are born believing in magic

it's the first thing we take away

Fill them with doubt instead of magic

and fear instead of trust

And after awhile, they're just like us

On this earth there is a city

in a rich green pleasant country

Where they kill their children

the children of the streets

Free enterprise extermination

why waste rehabilitation?

a bullet is forever

It's so final quick and cheap

And the despots all wear policemen's badges

Kill to supplement their wages

Earn their bloody bounty

with the gun and the club and knife

While profit-concious businessmen

Upright solid citizens

Pay them a cew cruzeiros

for every murdered street kids life

(But they're children!)

They're garbage on the streets

(Oh the children!)

They're beggars, whores and theives

(Oh pity the children!)

Cry pity if you will,

There's none on the streets

of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil

To bless this piece of paradise

High on a hill stands Jesus Christ

Gazing down with sightless eyes

at the daily blasphemy

A mocking marble coontradiction

arms spread wide in benediction

Suffer the little children,

suffer them to come to me

And the despots cry "amen, amen"

while they bow their knees to Bethlehem

They spit in the face of humankind

Turn our dreams to worthless dust

And the future, as it's always done,

stares down the barrel of a gun

Which once more begs the question,

When will the despots come for us?

(But they're children!)

Have you seen their eyes?

(Oh the children!)

Hard and wary and street-wise

(Oh pity the children!)

There are no children here

Only old eyes full of hunger

and hate and hopeless fear

(But they're children!)

Abandoned and forsaken

(Oh the children!)

Useless human flotsam

(Oh pity the children!)

And pity us as well

For in our childrens' eyes

We see mirrors of ourselves