Sharpened Spring

It is in the small things we see it. The child's first step, as awesome as an earthquake. The first time you rode a bike, wallowing up the sidewalk. The first spanking when your heart went on a journey all alone. When they called you crybaby or poor or fatty or crazy and made you into an alien, you drank their acid and concealed it. [chorus] the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner! the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner! the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner! the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner! You did not fondle the weakness inside you though it was there. Your courage was a small coal that you kept swallowing. If your buddy saved you and died himself in so doing, then his courage was not courage, it was love; love as simple as shaving soap. [chorus] the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner the death of bombs and bullets you didn’t do it with a banner each spring will be a sword you'll sharpen, those you love will live in a fever of love, and you'll bargain with the calendar and at the last moment when death opens the back door you'll put on your carpet slippers and stride out.