Helen’s song

Helen just sittin’ down

To wing a song of you

To sing a song of your strength

Of the power bubbling through

To sing a song of your laughter

Of your sorrow and your pain.

 

(Chorus)

Helen just sittin’ down

To sing a song of you

To sing a song of your strength

Of the power bubbling through

To sing a song of your laughter

Of your sorrow and your pain

To sing a song of your anger :

Your struggles and your gains,

 

I remember you in the street

In the discussions

The slip of your feet

I remember you at the vigil

The sleepless nights

To go on

In the dancing

In the prancing

In the courthouse

Of the boss

Inside the prison walls

Far into the country halls

We feel the loss

We feel the loss

 

But everytime that

the streets are blocked

The nights are seized

And the clocks are stopped

Everytime a challenge stirs

Cement glistens and

The alley cats purr

Everytime the ripples rise

The growling grows

And the crazy eyes

Turn their gaze past

The glittering tawdry prize

And focus

On the frauds

We’re asked to live

 

This song is about Helen Golding,

a radical lawyer, in Sydney Australia,

who was tragically killed in a car accid-

ent in the late seventies. She is sorely

missed by many people, especially

those on the fringes, that she helped.

 

Every time a spray-can hand

A clenched fist

A growing ragged band

Shake the state

And make the bourgeois quake

I think we’ll hear you

In the crowd.

 

Every time the caged one cry

The boldening sisters

Patriachs defy

Bars wither

And the stone walls crack

Our rulers shiver

And their thugs

And screws turn back

Deros dance and sing

Workers refuse the sack

Kids laughter shatters

The cathedral bells

Monuments to greed

And exploitation felled

I think we’ll hear you

In the crowd

I think we’ll hear you

In the crowd.

 

(Chorus)