Pete Seeger
All My Children of the Sun
The navigator said to the engineer I think our radio's dead
I can hear but I can't send and there's bad weather ahead
The pilot said to the co-pilot our right engine's gone
But if we can make it over these mountains perhaps I can set her down
All my children of the sun
Five hundred miles from nowhere we belly landed on a river
We bid a quick goodbye to that ship of silver
Twenty five piled out the window, twеnty reached the shorе
We turned to see our metal bird sink to rise no more
All my children of the sun
We found some floating logs, we found some sharp stones
We cut some vines and made a raft, it was our only hope
The navigator said he thought there was a town somewhere downstream
So now each tried to do his best to paddle as a team
All except one young guy who kept arguing with the navigator
He said he'd read about a waterfall we would come to sooner or later
At a river's bend he persuaded us to bring our craft to beach
But a search party found the river smooth as far as eye could reach
All my children of the sun
Once again he persuaded us to stop, we cursed at the delay
Once again we found the river flowing on the same old way
We said shut up your arguing, you give us all a pain
Why don't you pitch in and go your part be constructive for a change
All my children of the sun
Still egghead kept on talking in the same long winded way
We said if you won't paddle get the hell out of our way
We told him to go sit far back at the stern
Then we strained to paddle harder and then the river made a turn
All my children of the sun
One paddler heard sound of tapping and what he saw when he did turn
Was egghead with a sharp stone cutting the vines that bound the stern
With a cry of rage the paddler leaped up to his feet
He swung his long pole knocked egghead into the deep
But now the logs were splaying out
The raft had come unbound
Like mad we paddled for the shore before all would drown
All my children of the sun
A search party went out to find more vines to tie the raft up tight
In twenty minutes they returned their faces pale with fright
They said a quarter mile down river we did find a waterfall
It's over a hundred feet in height, it would have killed us all
All my children of the sun
And that is why on the banks of a far off wilderness stream
Which none of us, none of us will ever see again
There stands a cross for someone hardly older than a boy
Who we thought was only trying to destroy
All my children of the sun