The Box

Once upon a time in the land of hushabye

Around about the wondrous days of yore

I came across a sort of box

Bound up with chains and locked with locks

And labelled kindly do not touch it's war

Decree was issued round about

All with a flourish and a shout

And a gaily coloured mascot tripping lightly on before

Don't fiddle with this deadly box or

Break the chains or pick the locks

And please don't ever play about with war

Well the children understood

Children happen to be good

They were just as good around the time of yaw

They didn't try to pick the locks

Or break into that deadly box

They never tried to play about with war

Mummies didn't either

Sisters aunts grannies neither

Cause they were quiet and sweet

And pretty in those wondrous days of yaw

Well very much the same as now

Not the ones to blame somehow

For opening up that deadly box of war

But someone did

Someone battered in the lid

And spilled the insides out across the floor

A sort of bouncy bumpy ball made up

Of guns and flags and all the tears

And horror and the death that goes with war

It bounced right out

And went bashing all about

And bumping into everything and stored

And what was sad and most unfair is

That it didn't seem to care who much it bumped

Or why or what or for

It bumped the children mainly

And I'll tell you this quite plainly

It bumps them every day and more and more

And leaves them dead and burned and dying

Thousands of them sick and crying

Cause when it bumps it's really very sore

Now theres a way to stop the ball

It isn't difficult at all

All it takes is wisdom I'm absolutely

Sure that we could get it back into the box

And buy the chains and lock the locks

No one seems to want to save the children any more

Well thats the way it all appears

Cause it's been bouncing round for years and years

In spite of all the wisdom wiz since

Those wondrous days of yaw

And the time they came across the box

Bound up with chains and locked with locks

And labelled kindly do not touch it's war

The Box - John Denver