Cardboard Box City

(album: A Weapon Called The Word - 1990)

Have you seen them in every station
Begging in their separate ways
Some of them are no more than children
Some of them are runaways
I don't care for your opinion
I've seen you turn your face the other way
And you said son
What's your problem
Can't we talk about this over lunch some day

And I bet you've never
Been south of the river
Down the old Kent road or down
Southwark way
I bet you've never never seen them
Lying in the litter
In the cardboard boxes
Where you make them stay

In the docklands of East London
Where those great tall ships once sailed
Of a price of couple of hundred thousands
I have seen your condominiums for sale
In the north by the archway tavern
You can see them lying there every day
And they're drunk and they scream their minds to the heaven
Dear lord why did it have to be this way

And I bet you've never
Been south of the river
Down the old Kent road or down
Southwark way
I bet you've never never seen them
Lying in the litter
In the cardboard boxes
Where you make them stay

I worked some time I paid my taxes
I lined your pockets with my pay
You said you'd take my money
You said you'd help them
But in your pockets it just seems to stay
And I've seen your fancy house in Richmond
And where you moor your boat down Kingston way
In the weekend you take your wife out sailing
Try taking her down south London some day

And I bet you've never
Been south of the river
Down the old Kent road or down
Southwark way
I bet you've never never seen them
Lying in the litter
In the cardboard boxes
Where you make them stay
In the cardboard boxes
Where they have to stay