They say he didn't have an enemy
His was a greatness to behold
He was the last surviving progeny
The last one on this side of the world
He measured half a mile from tip to tail
silver and black with powerful
fins
They say he could split
a mountain in two
That's how we got the Grand Canyon
Some say they saw him
at the Great Lakes
Some say they saw him off the coast
of Florida
My mother said she saw him in Chinatown
but you can't always trust your mother.
Off the Carolinas the sun
shines brightly in the day
The lighthouse glows
ghostly there are night
The chief of a local tribe had killed
a racist mayor's son
and he'd been on death row
since 1958
The mayor's kid was a rowdy pig
spit on Indians and lots worse
The old chief buried a hatchet in his head
life compared to death
for him seemed worse
The tribal brothers gathered
in the lighthouse to sing
and tried to conjure up a storm or rain
The harbor parted and the great
whale sprang full up
and caused a huge tidal wave
The wave crushed the jail
and freed the chief
The tribe let out a roar
The whites were drowned
the browns and reds set free
but sadly one thing more
Some local yokel member
of the NRA
kept a bazooka in his living room
and thinking he had the chief
in his sights
blew the whale's brains out with a lead
harpoon
Well Americans don't care
for much of anything
land and wa ter the least
And animal life is low on the
totem pole
with human life not worth much
more than infected yeast
Americans don't care too much
for beauty
They'll shit in a river,
dump battery acid in a stream
They'll watch dead rats
wash up on the beach
and complain if they can't swim
They say things are done
for the majority
Don't believe half of what you see
and none of what you hear
It's a lot like what my painter
friend Donald said to me
"Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over,
they're done"