The Miracle of Life

A lost paradise of the new world
Calls to illiterate and violent conquerors full of greed
Armed with guns and knives
Can you hear them?
Cinnamon-skinned, mulattoes and mestizos, blessed by the sun
Walk straight toward us, weapons in hand, but left their hearts in the cradle

They come to our city to impose their rules,
Tattoo us with their symbols, and teach us their ideology:
Half-built homes, half-lived lives

BANG! BANG! BANG!
In the streets you hear gunshots from well-armed cowards
Followed by cries of mothers and sisters who find
The bullet-ridden bodies of their loved ones lying there
They can’t finish mourning because the shots ring out again
BANG! BANG!
A few blocks away, another boy leaves his home—
A fight he wasn’t part of decides how far he’ll get in life

Boys with more battlefield experience than our soldiers
Girls bearing widowhood and the pain of prostitutes
Sons who saw their fathers die, and fathers who never wanted their sons
Blind mothers who don’t correct, mothers who ignore,
Mothers whose voices were buried long ago

BANG!
Another boy is dead
They mistook him because of his tattoos, but they didn’t care
In the streets there’s no gray, just enemies or family
They shot without fear and without checking if he was the bastard they were after
His boss, friend, and mentor lifts him up
Helps load his body into a garbage bag, and into the truck
No need to figure out how he died, no paperwork needed
They take his body and put it in the box, back into confinement

“A funeral hurts” he says, trembling
“The court is won, dog—but the war goes on”
The one who gave the farewell didn’t know him, didn’t know his name
But their tattoos bound them like family
And in that family, there are two creeds, two hymns:
“I kill for you, and I die for you”
The funeral ends, they go back to work in the streets
Except for his mother, still screaming his name—
The only one who knew his name

It’s the curse of the children of the hood
Their birthplace marks them as thieves, murderers, rapists
But worse still, the hood godfathers them—
And turns them into fools, incompetents, losers...
BANG! BANG! BANG!

They go around collecting an offering for the family of another fallen
House by house, they ask—demand—a contribution for this member
Who died at enemy hands just two blocks from home
“The Word of God gives life,” says the minister,
While at the shout of “Now!” those lives are taken
In the neighborhood streets, what you’ll hear most is:
BANG! and Amen
Unhappy and violent—but believers.

BANG! BANG!
Three died at dawn, before the rooster even crowed
But there’s no time to mourn them
Their rulers need them to hear the message they’ve prepared
A white man in a suit, expensive shoes, and a flashy watch says:
“We’re not your enemies”—but neither does he say they’re friends
So many white lies, stained with the blood of their pawns
He finishes his speech, goes home to his wife, kids, and maid
Takes a shower and changes—
Now it’s time to play golf.

Outro
Fathers who had no fathers
Bring life to more children than they can count
They don’t know how to lift them out of misery
And condemn them to live as they did

There’s faith, but no support
There’s punishment, but no mercy
It’s hard to hear God in that situation
When bullets fly past you,
Mothers wail in the streets,
And the patrol cars approach slowly

A gangster dies
And another is born.