Means I will die a child of the sixties

Some things change, and some things remain the same. This is me, fifty-six years ago, protesting Richard Nixon’s invasion of Cambodia and the killing of four students at Kent State University.

Last April, clad in my protest uniform, I was with hundreds more at a No Kings resistance day.

The past curves back, more spiral than arc.

What remains is war. Always war. And stupidity. And blindness. And greed.

King Don is only the latest!

For you and me, it can feel hopeless. Unless someone offers us words that express what we feel. Then, we feel less impotent and alone.

In Why Bob Dylan Matters, Harvard Classics Professor Richard Thomas puts it this way:

It is through song that we give depth to the sentiments for which mere speech is at times insufficient…Poetry and music are compensations for the pain that comes along with the human condition, and they are what can help us along.

Master Dylan adds this

It doesn’t really matter where a song comes from. It just matters where it takes you.

Where do these words, written so long ago, take you today?

The words for Dylan’s “Masters of War” came to him and to us in 1963.

Come you masters of war
You that build the big guns
You that build the death planes
You that build all the bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks

You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly

Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain

You fasten all the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you sit back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
While the young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud

You’ve thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins

How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
That even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do

Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could?
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul

And I hope that you die
And your death will come soon
I’ll follow your casket
By the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand over your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead

_________________________________________________________________________________________