From http://www.joanbaez.com/Lyrics/pristrilogy.html -


PRISON TRILOGY
(Words and Music by Joan Baez)

Billy Rose was a low rider.
Billy Rose was a night fighter.
Billy Rose knew trouble like the sound of his own name,
Busted on a drunken charge,
Driving someone else's car,
The local midnight sheriff's claim to fame.

In an Arizona jail,
There are some who tell the tale
How Billy fought the sergeant for some milk that he demanded,
Knowing they'd remain the boss,
Knowing he would pay the cost.
They saw he was severely reprimanded.

In the blackest cell on "A" Block,
He hanged himself at dawn,
With a note stuck to the bunk head:
"Don't mess with me, just take me home."

Come and lay, help us lay young Billy down.

Luna was a Mexican
The law called an alien,
For coming across the border with a baby and a wife.
Though the clothes upon his back were wet,
Still he thought that he could get
Some money and things to start a life.

It hadn't been too very long
When it seemed like everything went wrong.
They didn't even have the time to find themselves a home.
This foreigner, a brown-skin male,
Thrown into a Texas jail,
It left the wife and baby quite alone.

He eased the pain inside him
With a needle in his arm,
But the dope just crucified him.
He died to no one's great alarm.

Come and lay, help us lay young Luna down,
And we're gonna raze, raze the prisons to the ground.

Kilowatt was an aging con of 65
Who stood a chance to stay alive
And leave the joint and walk the streets again.
As the time he was to leave drew near,
He suffered all the joy and fear
Of leaving 35 years in the pen.

And on the day of his release,
He was approached by the police
Who took him to the warden walking slowly by his side.
The warden said "You won't remain here,
But it seems a state retainer
Claims another 10 years of your life."

He stepped out in the Texas sunlight. The cops all stood around.
Old Kilowatt ran 50 yards then threw himself down on the ground.

They might as well just have laid the old man down
And we're gonna raze, raze the prisons to the ground.
Help us raze, raze the prisons to the ground.

© 1971, 1972 Chandos Music (ASCAP)