How Far

Five months and fifty years I have breathed the air of freedom
Behind my shroud of white comfort and grade    
With all our laws of equal rights and equal pay  
And actions to affirm that we mean what we say  
With Supreme Court decisions we can always make undone  
Another man declared “just look how far that we have come”  
What a joke the trembling words of ignorance!    
When the lines become blurred between hatred and romance  
Stay sick when you’re unwell, then die and go to Hell  
And if you’re in the mood to buy I got a bridge I wanna sell  
We need more cash to finish the fence along the porous south  
While we cut out stamped assistance to feed your hungry mouths  
Cut back money to public schools where learning is sedated
To keep OUR growing minds more highly educated    
We still have jobs for you that no one else will do  
Found clever ways to pay you less than a minimum living wage  
Taking kickbacks from plastic cards instead of cash or checks  
That charge you if you spend and charge you more to save  
We found more ways to make a profit from all the choices that we gave  
‘Cos if we cannot own you, we’ll still work you like a slave  
We’ll watch our hood for hoodlums out for an evening walk    
And stand our ground against snacking hoodies that we stalk  
Or stop and frisk everyone we profile as suspicious  
But keep them at a distance in case their color is contagious  
We’ll power up the House to defund head-start for underprivileged youth  
Then we’ll pass eleven laws to make sure that you still lose  
Just like the right to vote you were never supposed to use  
‘Cos time has surely eliminated those who discriminated    
So said most of the Supreme Pawns who were selected  
Through haughty high strung puppets we elected  
Who in hatred and in-justice were truly deaf and dumb  
Yet clearly I can see how far we have not come