Is This Art?

(album: Levellers - 1993)

They took me to the battlefield
Saw the mushroom clouds
Said 'I can see the colours
Even when my head is bowed'
And they showed me the destruction
The slaughter a la carte
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

They took me to the hospital
And pulled aside the sheet
Said 'Look at that pulsating
Just listen to the beat'
And they showed me the incision
Then took away the heart
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

They took me to the scientist
Who opened up a phial
He said 'This is only chicken pox
And rhino bile'
And they showed me what it did to mice
They said 'This is just the start'
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?

They took me to the tenement
And kicked down the door
They said: 'Have you seen the copulation
Practised by the poor
We select the ones to breed
Then we reject the part'
And isn't nature wonderful
But is this art?