USA

When I was young 

I watched the cars 

When I was older 

I drank in bars 

When I was young 

I chewed the leaves 

When I was older 

I drank with thieves 

I found a love 

She gave me dreams 

She left me drunk 

In New Orleans 

So cold and lonely 

So all alone 

I wished my heart 

Was made of stone 

I took the cold bright needle 

I used it as a sword 

My eyes have seen the glory of 

The coming of the Lord 

I burned across the delta 

I swam across the ford 

My eyes have seen the glory of 

The coming of the Lord 

When I was a young man 

Standing on this road 

My empty belly 

An aching hole 

An old man said to me 

"Kid don't you know 

That it's the same 

Wherever you go" 

I gambled in two graveyards 

I won against the odds 

With the smiling saints 

And the silent saviours 

With the maggots and the gods 

I cursed the things they showed me 

I could never see again 

And the howling of the wind at night 

I wrote upon the rain 

I found the thing 

For which I prayed 

And came back home 

To the USA 

With a heart of stone 

And now I know 

That it's the same 

Wherever you go