Who's America?

The Face You Have Seen April has come (April of 1941) The month we were waiting for Through the dark winter Begins. . The old man with the face you have seen Tough and kind and none too bright But lasting The face you have seen getting on the streetcar At the mill gate stop Or the gusty corner Now under the blood-soaked handkerchief Looks out at you With blood oozing down the forehead From under the handerkerchief And blood on the collar of the old overcoat. . "We'll be in it by April" They said Sure enough The fighting has started And this old man with the face you have seen Is the first to get hurt "Whose America?" somebody asked And is this the answer? Another old man With a face you also have seen a face you have seen Getting out of limousines At the bank entrance or the War Department Asks us to remember '94 (when the army broke the Pullman strike.) That was a time to forget I thought And I think right now is the worst of all possible times To ask us to remember. . It is April now The month we were waiting for But was it for this That we waited The berserk cop with the brandished club The armored bus spraying gas on the pickets The mobbing howl of the press And the rabies in Congress— "to the electric chair with the strikers"? Whose America anyhow? Now in this April We need to find out Yes, all of us need to know Whose America Because if it really isn't the America of the old man With the face which is our face Tough and kind and none too bright But lasting Then, well we are going to have to do some thinking Some mighty hard thinking. . This is the April we were waiting for This is the April This April Now