DON MCLEAN - Orphans of wealth lyrics

There is no time to discuss or debate

What is right, what is wrong for our people

Time has run out for all those who wait

With bent limbs and minds that are feeble

And the rain falls and blows through their window

And the snow falls and blows through their door

And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation

When the tides rise, they cover the floor

They come from the north and they come from the south

And they come from the hills and the valleys

And they're migrants and farmers and miners and humans

Our census neglected to tally

And the rain falls and blows through their window

And the rain falls and it blows through their door

And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation

When the tides rise, they cover the floor

And they're African, Mexican, Caucasian, Indian

Hungry and hopeless Americans

The orphans of wealth and of adequate health

Disowned by this nation they live in

And with weather worn hands on bread lines they stand

Yet but one more degradation

And they're treated like tramps while we sell them food stamps

This thriving and prosperous nation

And the rain falls and blows through their window

And the snow falls and blows through their door

And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation

When the tides rise, they cover the floor

And with roaches and rickets and rats in the thickets

Infested, diseased and decaying

With rags and no shoes and skin sores that ooze

By the poisonous pools, they are playing

In shacks of two rooms that are rotting wood tombs

With corpses breathing inside them

And we pity their plight as they call in the night

And we do all that we can do to hide them

And the rain falls and blows through their window

And the snow falls in white drifts that fold

And the tides rise with floods in the nursery

And a child is crying, he's hungry and cold

His life has been sold, his young face looks old

It's the face of America, dying