Browne Jackson Lawless Avenues Lyrics

Lawless Avenues Lyrics

Papa hit him, Mama kissed him
Made him go to Catechism
With the sisters in
their black and white
And all the time those city streets
Were teaching
him another kind of wisdom
When to run and when to fight
Up at the
playground after school
Listening to tales of the prison system
And those
lawless avenues
Down on a half darkened street
A child's footsteps
repeat
And something there turns them
Down those lawless
avenues
Silent Joe went down so bad
He was the strongest fighter the
avenues had
Stabbed in the chest-- he went down swinging
Someone from
some other part of town
No one even seen it coming down
And you don't
hear no church bells ringing
And in the violent night the police
light
Sweeps across the lots and the yards
Following those lawless
avenues
Down on a half darkened street
Armies advance and retreat
And
struggle to take control
From those lawless avenues
Manuelito's sister
Rosa
Ran away with a surfer from Hermosa
        Manuelito, cuida a
Rosa
        Hay mira como estan las cosas!
        (Manuelito, take care
of Rosa
        Look at how things are)
But who could blame her after she
saw
Every boy die who could have gotten close to her
        Rosa es
joven y solo quiere
        ver la belleza del mundo
        (Rosa is
young and only wants
        to see the beauty of the world)
Manuel
said--
"You gotta fight for what you want in this life"
Just before they
shipped him overseas to 'Nam
        Otra guerra sin razon
        Otra
guerra sin fin, sin honor
        (Another war without reason
       
Another war without end, without honor)
And she was fighting to
understand
When they shipped Manuelito's body home
All she heard was one
more shot
Echoing down lawless avenues
Hoy amigo, tal igual como
ayer,
La lucha en el barrio no cambia
Nuestros hijos son los que han de
crecer
Por ley de la calle, viviendo entre abrazos
Y chingazos
(Today
my friend, just like yesterday,
The struggle in the barrio doesn't
change
Our children are the ones to grow up
By the law of the
street,
Living between hugs and blows)
Down on a half darkened
street
Fathers' and sons' lives repeat
And something there turns
them
Down those lawless avenues
En el calor de la calle
(In the heat
of the street)
Buscan el valor en la calle
(Looking for valor in the
street)
Hasta final de la calle
(Till the end of the street)