Blood Brothers

When the world takes you over, remember who you were.

Brother, O Brother!

We were born of great labor;

Given tall frames to construct structures,

Told to plow the fields to gain favor!

We were simply nothing less than blood and flesh.

 

From the womb we came,

Into the ground we will go;

The fleshy walls that could not hold us

Gave us to the earth to swallow whole"

As if we were dung, keeping the World fertile.

 

By blood we will give,

Our lives will be sacrificed

For industry, for agriculture,

For mathematics, for science, for art.

But Brother, what does that leave us to receive?

 

My back is breaking,

Oh Brother, beneath the weight

Of demand.  So much is asked of us,

But for what cost? Our humanity?

We are the Dependables--the Throwaways--

 

Held in factories,

Churning out pieces and parts

To construct tall structures, nothing is

Natural, Brother.  We've all become

Machines, with heavy loads, mass-reproducing.

 

The World seldom gives,

And when we hold our hands out

We will find veins turned into wires,

Skin made into layers of metal.

But remember Brother: steel was once flesh,

   Oil was once blood,

                               And we were nothing less.