World In Motion - Read these words!

These are from a Jackson Browne CD released in '89. Although originally inspired by the misadventures of fools like Reagan and Poppy, the words were eerily prescient considering what's happening now. They could have been written today.

World In Motion

Sun going down in the USA
Down on Main there's a family sleeping in a doorway
Around the corner you can hear the sound
People dancing around the golden calf
Those who have not, those who have
On the billboards and the T.V. screens
They got food and cars and toys and trucks and jeans
Like a homeless child's fitful dreams
Smiling faces free from wanting
Life's abundances beyond counting
World in motion -- speed your changes
Close your distances, find your angels
Lose your fears and meet your dangers
World in motion
Once we were running through smoke and fire
Running into the sun
In the rush of youth, for love and truth
Our deeds were done
Now we awake with a world at stake
And a race we run
We run
Sun going down on the USA
Sun coming up a hundred years away
On another world and another time
Things like hunger, greed and hatred
One way or another, gonna be eradicated
World in motion -- speed your changes
Close your distances, drive your angels
Lose your fears and meet your dangers
World in motion
'Till the world I look out at this world and see
Is the world I know this world can be
You have a volunteer in me
Now come on

Anything Can Happen

Time will come when we know what happened here
Change will come in time and make it clear
We learn one thing if we learn at all
In the secret wars we call our lives
Anything can happen
We watch the days, we make our plans
We change in ways a life demands
But what ever pleasure this life may allow
I'll give you the love I have for you now
Because anything can happen
In a world so full of fear
Dreams are whispered in the dead of night
And people disappear
But you hear my heart and you know I'm still here
Although you know and I know you know
While I swear I'll never let you go
Anything can happen
Yeah, if this love can happen here
Anything can
We watch the days we make our plans
We change in ways a life demands
I'll always remember this time, this place
The hope in your voice, the light on your face
Because anything can happen
In a world so full of pain
People give their lives to making war
And we call those people sane
But I love you where your dreams remain
Though you never say it anymore
One day there'll be an end to this war
And who knows
We may see what we're here for
Anything can happen
Yeah, if this love has found us here
Anything can
Can happen

How Long

When you look into a child's face
And you're seeing the human race
And the endless possibilities there
Where so much can come true
And you think of the beautiful things
A child can do

How long - would the child survive
How long - if it was up to you

When you think about the money spent
On defense by a government
And the weapons of destruction we've built
We're so sure that we need
And you think of the millions and millions
That money could feed

How long - can you hear someone crying
How long - can you hear someone dying
Before you ask yourself why?
And how long will we hear people speaking
About missiles for peace
And just let it go by
How long will they tell us these weapons
Are keeping us free
That's a lie

If you saw it from a satellite
With its green and its blue and white
The beauty of the curve of the earth
And its oceans below
You might think it was paradise
If you didn't know
You might think that it's turning
But it's turning so slow

How long - can you hear someone crying
How long - can you hear someone dying
Before you ask yourself why?
And how long will it be 'till we've turned
To the tasks and the skills
That we'll have to have learned
If we're going to find our place in the future
And have something to offer
Where this planet's concerned
How long?

Eve of Destruction

The Eastern World
It is explodin'
Violence flarin'
Bullets loadin'
You're old enough to kill
But not for votin'
You don't believe in war
But what's that gun you're totin'
And even the Jordan River has bodies floatin'


But you tell me over, and over, and over again my friend
Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction


Don't you understand what I'm tryin' to say
And can't you feel the fears I'm feelin' today
If the button is pushed, there's no runnin' away
There'll be no one to save
With the whole world in a grave
Take a look around you boy,
It's bound to scare you boy


And you tell me over, and over, and over again my friend
Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction


Yeah, my blood's so mad
Feels like coagulatin'
I'm sittin' here, just contemplatin'
I can't twist the truth
It knows no regulation
Handful of senators don't pass legislation
And marches alone can't bring integration
When human respect is disintegratin'
This whole crazy world
Is just too frustratin'


And you tell me over, and over, and over again my friend
Ah, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction


And think of all the hate there is in Red China
Then take a look around to Selma, Alabama
Ah you may leave here for four days in space
But when you return it's the same old place
The poundin' of the drums
The pride and disgrace
You can bury your dead, but don't leave a trace
Hate your next door neighbor, but don't forget to say grace


But you tell me over, and over, and over, and over again my friend
You don't believe we're on the eve of destruction
No, no, you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction


**please note: this song was written when the voting age was 21 but the draft age was 18.**

LIVES IN THE BALANCE

I've been waiting for something to happen
For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you've seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war

And there's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs

On the radio talk shows and the T.V.
You hear one thing again and again
How the U.S.A. stands for freedom
And we come to the aid of a friend
But who are the ones that we call our friends--
These governments killing their own?
Or the people who finally can't take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone
There are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

There's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who fan the flames
Of the wars that are fought in places
Where we can't even say the names

They sell us the President the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us every thing from youth to religion
The same time they sell us our wars
I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
But they're never the ones to fight or to die
And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

(c) 1986 SWALLOW TURN MUSIC, ASCAP

goosebumps. Let's just hope today's youth can generate as much passion.

I think it's off of the Bridge Benefit CD from about 10 yrs ago. It's one of my favorites.