Reluctant Journey

(Wayne Mackenzie)

"Not another protest song about our pitiful past," I hear you cry. Well hopefully, there's a

different slant to this one. Anyway, you can make your own mind up on that one.

Familiar coastlines to unfriendly shores

Home was home, no not anymore

Kingdom of Summer, written in stone

Your brothers and lovers crossed the ocean alone

Clearance of land, that was their birthright

Moving through hell that and highrights

Reluctant journey out of the sun

Whatever became of your country's sons

No turning back, not one to run away

Fighting more than the elements they say

Across to the new, cast from the old

What laid before them, what they were told

A brave new world, theirs for the taking

One more clearance of the land in the making

Strike out for the West, bounty, land and liberty

To die in the new, for the old it was easy

To the native tongues, it was Indian summers

Raped on the land, covered with banners

Starts and stripes over bullets and blood

Chased from the Nations, 'cross Rio Grande mud

Two hundred years past, covered wagons gone

Taken their place in what progress has borne

Of native tongues, old worlds pushed aside

Roadside reservations, small wonder little pride