Bruce Cockburn
Grim Travellers
[Verse 1]
The ministers meet—work on the movement of goods
Also work on the movement of capital
Also work on the movement of human beings
As if we were so many cattle

[Chorus]
Grim travellers in dawn skies
See the beauty—makes you cry inside
It makes you angry and you don't know why
Grim travellers in dawn skies

[Verse 2]
Twelve mercenaries got weapons primed
Gonna take that African nation in record time
You wonder why they bother, why not leave it alone?
They say "Every man wants to retire to a place he can call his own"

[Chorus]
Those grim travellers in dawn skies
They see the beauty—makes them cry inside
It makes them angry and they don't know why
Grim travellers in dawn skies

[Verse 3]
Redness, richer than a rose
Blooms against the backdrop of somebody's white clothes
Bitter little girls and boys from the Red Army Underground
They'd blow away Karl Marx if he had the nerve to come around
[Chorus]
They're just grim travellers in dawn skies
They see the beauty—makes them cry inside
It makes them angry and they don't know why
They're grim travellers in dawn skies

[Verse 4]
Down on the plain of ten thousand smokestacks
Trucks butt each other to establish dominance
The newspaper next to me leans over and says matter-of-factly
"Sacred mountain towers above meadows"
Uh huh and above us

[Chorus]
Grim travellers in dawn skies
I see the beauty—it makes me cry inside
It makes me angry and I don't know why
We're grim travellers in dawn skies