xPrison Trilogy (Billy Rose)
Joan Baez
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Billy Rose was a low rider, Billy Rose was a night fighter
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Billy Rose knew trouble like the sound of his own name
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Busted on a drunken charge
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Driving someone else's car
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The local midnight sheriff's claim to fame
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In an Arizona jail there are some who tell the tale, how
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Billy fought the sergeant for some milk that he demanded
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Knowing they'd remain the boss
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Knowing he would pay the cost
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They saw he was severely reprimanded
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In the blackest cell on A Block
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He hanged himself at dawn
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With a note stuck to the bunk head
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Don't mess with me, just take me home
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Come and lay, help us lay
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young Billy down
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Luna was a Mexican the law calls an alien
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For coming across the border with a baby and a wife
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Though the clothes upon his back were wet
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Still he thought that he could get
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Some money and things to start a life
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It hadn't been too very long when it seemed like everything went wrong
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They didn't even have the time to find themselves a home
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This foreigner, a brown-skin male
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Thrown inside a Texas jail
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It left the wife and baby quite alone
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He eased the pain inside him
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With a needle in his arm
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But the dope just crucified him
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He died to no one's great alarm
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Come and lay, help us lay
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Young Luna down
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And we're gonna raze, raze the prisons
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To the ground
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Kilowatt was an aging con of 65 who stood a chance to stay alive
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And leave the joint and walk the streets again
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As the time he was to leave drew near
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He suffered all the joy and fear
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Of leaving 35 years in the pen
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And on the day of his release he was approached by the police
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Who took him to the warden walking slowly by his side
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The warden said "You won't remain here
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But it seems a state retainer
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Claims another 10 years of your life."
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He stepped out in the Texas sunlight
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The cops all stood around
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Old Kilowatt ran 50 yards
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Then threw himself down on the ground
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They might as well just have laid
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The old man down
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And we're gonna raze, raze the prisons
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To the ground
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Help us raze, raze the prisons
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To the ground
