Dizraeli, Tom Caruana - What River is This? lyrics

Tell me if you can, what river is this?
A cracked gully, a gutter, a trickle of piss
Crow catches rat and picks at it's ribs
And on the banks
What once were villagers live

Fine spot for a match of cricket is this
Here where the noon sun blisters your lips
And the houses are rags
And splinters are sticks
And the kids' bones are
Toothpicks for the rich

This is the hole where India shit's
Even the train tracks give it a miss
And the sea shudders to think of it's kiss
White man, that’s the kind of river this is

Tell me if you can
Just tell me if you can (Taking a train)
Tell me if you can
Tell me if you can (Taking a train)
(Taking a train, taking a tr)

Tell me then, friend, what government's this?
Sleeping in the shade with it's
Guns at it's hips
Head resting on the bundle that
Is bloody and whipped
Belly pushing our under the jut of his ribs

Because his unpaid wage has
Him hungry for tips
Like the truckers at the picket line
Wanting a lift and the slum kids hunting for
A pocket to pick
And all the others that have felt
The thud of his stick

This government sleeps by a puddle of spit
Crimson and white
Like a skull crushed with a brick
But once he cried out of love for his kids
Understand, ill is what this government is

Tell me if you can (Tell me if you can)
Tell me if you can (Tell me if you can)
Tell me if you can (Tell me if you can)
Tell me if you can (Tell me if you can)

(They've got begging bowls balanced on
The spheres of their stomachs
Injustice is as fierce as the sun is
So there’s justice, inevitable
Here is the underoots of
Here, motherfuckers with beer
In their tumblers
Would say, "Isn't poverty fascinating?")