I'll tell you the story of John Henry Faulk.
|
I'll tell you of his trials and the troubled trail he walked,
|
And I'll tell of the tyrants, the ones you never see:
|
Murder is the role they play and hatred is their fee.
|
|
On the TV and the radio John Henry Faulk was known.
|
He talked to many thousands with a mind that was his own,
|
But he could not close his eyes when the lists were passed around,
|
So he tried to move the Union to tear the blacklist down.
|
|
His friends they tried to warn him he was headin' for a fall.
|
If he spoke against the blacklist he had no chance at all,
|
But he laughed away their warnings and he laughed away their fears:
|
For how could lies destroy the work of many honest years?
|
|
Then slowly, oh so slowly, his life began to change.
|
People would avoid his eyes, his friends were actin' strange,
|
And he finally saw the power of the hidden poison pen
|
When they told him that his job was through, he'd never work again.
|
|
And he could not believe what his sad eyes had found.
|
He stared in disbelief as his world came tumblin' down,
|
And as the noose grew tighter, at last the trap was clear:
|
For every place he turned to go, that list would soon be there
|
-- Oh, that list.
|
|
And is there any bottom to the fears that grow inside?
|
Is there any bottom to the hate that you must hide?
|
And is there any end to your long road of despair?
|
Is there any end to the pain that you must bear?
|
|
His wife and children trembled, the time was runnin' short,
|
When a man of law got on their side and took them into court,
|
And there upon the stand they could not hide behind their eyes,
|
And the cancer of the fascist was displayed before our eyes.
|
|
Hey, you blacklist, you blacklist, I've seen what you have done.
|
I've seen the men you've ruined and the lives you've tried to run,
|
But the one thing that I've found is, the only ones you spare
|
Are those that do not have a brain, or those that do not care.
|
|
And you men who point your fingers and spread your lies around,
|
You men who left your souls behind and drag us to the ground,
|
You can put my name right down there, I will not try to hide --
|
For if there's one man on the blacklist, I'll be right there by his side.
|
|
For I'd rather go hungry to beg upon the streets
|
Than earn my bread on dead men's souls and crawl beneath your feet.
|
And I will not play your hater's game and hate you in return,
|
for it's only through the love of man the blacklist can be burned.
|
|
-----------------
|
The Ballad Of John Henry Faulk
|
Phil Ochs |