Wednesday 19 December 2012

A sack full of pain.


The blood of another brother
Heaped a load of hurt on my mother
My father driven insane would never be the same
His only gain from hiding his pain like a sack full of shame

Digging for gold, he wasn’t that old
Twenty-one, if you need to be told
Pounding rock in a hole when four ton of loose let go like a noose
Ending his life in a flash like a slash of a knife

It’s a sad thing to say at the end of the day
After you’ve picked up your tools and worked like fools
That your largest gain was a sack full of pain
And that toil and strife would map the end of a life

The hole in the ground was the place he was found
His tram a wreck but he couldn’t give a damn, not with his broken neck
There was dirt in his eyes and it was all washed aside
When Mama bent over him and her tears fell while she cried

So it was the end of October with the autumn winds on our shoulders
I pulled him out of the ground and took him to town
We wrapped him in a blue suit and laced on some new boots
They dug a new hole; we pushed him in low, and threw some loose upon him

And we that’s left behind got up and walked to the mine
We picked up our tools and we worked like fools
And it’s a sad thing to say at the end of the day
That our largest gain was a sack full of pain

Gunner ©