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Bob Dylan - Only A Pawn In Their Game

Only A Pawn In Their Game
Bob Dylan
03:28
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Song lyrics

A bullet from the back of a bush took Medgar Evers' blood,
A finger fired the trigger to his name,
A handle hid out in the dark,
A hand set the spark,
Two eyes took the aim
Behind a man's brain,
But he can't be blamed,
He's only a pawn in their game.

A South politician preaches to the poor white man,
"You got more than blacks, don't complain!
You're better than them, you been born with white skin!" they explain,
And the Negro's name
Is used, it is plain
For the politician's gain,
As he rises to fame,
And the poor white remains
On the caboose of the train,
But it ain't him to blame,
He's only a pawn in their game.

The deputy sheriffs, the soldiers, the governors get paid,
And the marshals and cops get the same,
But the poor white man's used in the hands of them all like a tool,
He's taught in his school
From the start by the rule
That the laws are with him
To protect his white skin,
To keep up his hate,
So he never thinks straight
'Bout the shape that he's in,
But it ain't him to blame,
He's only a pawn in their game.

From the poverty shacks he looks from the cracks to the tracks,
And the hoof beats pound in his brain,
And he's taught how to walk in a pack,
Shoot in the back
With his fist in a clinch,
To hang and to lynch,
To hide 'neath the hood,
To kill with no pain
Like a dog on a chain,
He ain't got no name,
But it ain't him to blame,
He's only a pawn in their game.

Today, Medgar Evers was buried from the bullet he caught,
They lowered him down as a king,
But when the shadowy sun sets on the one
That fired the gun,
He'll see by his grave
On the stone that remains
Carved next to his name
His epitaph plain:
‘Only a pawn in their game'.

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