Old Old Song

i'll sing you a song that starts out descriptive
and locates a time and a place
like a dinner table where a whole family
is just sitting down to say grace
an old old song that moves into action
taking its sweet sweet time
and waits until we all say amen
again and again in rhyme

it's the story of a father and a mother
who battle each other over nothin'
with a couple of kids trying to figure
which way the plot's spinning
who's winning and who is bluffing

it's a story as common as a penny, son
it ain't really worth anything to anyone

poor little sore little song
that aches like a muscle each time that it moves
sad little song that you play
and you play and you play
and you play 'til you lose
while history is outside writing a recipe book
for every earthly pain
this song is inside finger painting dark swirls
again and again and they all look the same

cuz what if you come home from school one day
and you find your whole family's at war
and there's this ominous silence just waiting to be broken
and there's secret places for hiding underneath the floorboards
and everyone seems to be bracing
for the subharmonic thunder of the next bomb
and everyone seems to be waiting for the cops to bust in
with their guns drawn
at the bleak light of dawn

it's a story as common as a penny, son
i don't think it's worth anything to anyone