It starts with sit down and tell us all a tale....

I was tempted to fall in love with a Gun Street girl
who could blow a hole in a yellow corvette.
I saw her pole dancing in a Birmingham jail.
But I get nervous when I hear slamming doors.
and don't want to leave Waukegan anymore.

I saw a weeping Smith & Wesson wise man
fix a broken toilet with an old trombone and
day old bread soaked in kerosene. And he kept saying;
"John, John he's long gone.  Gone to Indiana and he ain't never coming home."

Now I ride the rails to Barstow before the Free Train Riders of America finds me here.
Tomorrow I will buy a second hand nova from a Cuban-Chinese
As the Burlington-Northern went click clack on rain rusted tracks.
He kept one hand on his pistol and the other on the hatchback's driver door

The gun street girl bangs on the table with an old tin cup and sings about John, John
But he's long, gone to Indiana and he ain't never coming home.
So she get all liquored up on that road house corn.

We saw Zaitochi's moment of zen stitched onto a heart on a Saturday night,
It was special.
With his head full of bourbon and Kurosawa dreams in the straw. he stayed out
of circulation till his dogs got tired.

I took a hundred dollars from Slaughterhouse Joe
and bought a brand new Michigan twenty gauge.
As I walked out the door in my fireman's raincoat I said
I will never kiss a Gun Street girl again.
I will never kiss a Gun Street girl again.

The thunder and the roar
sumbitches never coming back here for more
I lay my hand of the pocket full of rain
Malcolm went up to Haarlem with a 45 in his jeans
He tried to use it on all his bad dreams
Steam steam, punk all those made schemes
Look at the shine, the shine of this Roosevelt dime
Its taking me to Baltimore because I am running out of time.
Riding on the the train in my Cincinnati jacket with a sad luck dame.

Steam, steam punk all those mad schemes
Malcolm went to Haarlem with a 45 in his jeans.
He tried to use it on all his bad dreams
Time, time, were running out of time
Can't buy principles unless you put them on the line.

We will hang down our heads tomorrow
Hang down our heads for Poe and his sorrow
Lend us your memories for tomorrow
So we can hoist that rag.

The sun is up and that will draw fire to the baby's cries.
Smoke is blackening out the sun
Tonight I read Company Aytch and clean my gun.
We have to open fire when we hit the shore
Incoming makes my ears ring as the tommy guns sing
Steel jackets with tracers declare all is fair in love and war
Hoist that rag.

Handsome Johnny cries for his mother and dies.
he drove an MG and listened to the Bee Gees.
I think of Keep The Aspiridita Flying as I lay dying
The sun is up and our world is flat
This rag will make damned good address for us rats.
Hoist that rag.