A Late Autumn Change
Some are laughin' and jokin',
Others sit there chain smokin'
while they talk about the good days gone by;
The old truths get broken
Into lies that turn golden
with a smile and the wink of an eye.
The young souls trade tokens
For the gravesites left open
underneath a yellow moon sky.
See them old dogs of war
As they pass by the door,
they’re saluting the prince and the king;
Have been marching by fours
Through the battles that roar
into tales of which minstrels will sing.
But like ships far from shore
They'll return nevermore
when at last those freedom bells ring.
There's a flag in the wood
That might fly, if it could,
over books that the priestess once read;
Never knew if she should
But she preached of man's good
while her gay lover waited in bed.
Back in the old neighborhood
Where a cross one time stood,
they’d hung her until she was dead.
Comes an echo of sound
From a far sacred ground
where the last chief chants out his death tune;
In the young village town
The folk gathered around
for they knew that he'd be coming soon.
Near that last little mound
The old chief was cut down,
but his soul still rides with the moon.
They say life's still a game
Without asking your name,
what you've done, or what’s been left to do;
They are caught between fame
And the shadows of shame,
both get seen from the same point of view.
Been wrapped up in the chains
Of a late autumn change,
and I pray that I'm just passing through.
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