A Man Named Clay

Birthing a song is like passing a stool after a long week of constipation. I started this song in the parked car of a suburban YMCA lot just last Sunday morning. While my wife sweated with all the pretty people of East Greenbush I stayed alone in the backseat with my guitar and a notebook, jumping out periodically to turn the car on for warmth. Yeah, a few cars stopped to observe before moving on to look for parking spots. But they hadn't spent time with Clay... (You can listen to this song at the following address: http://www.acidplanet.com/components/embedfile.asp?asset=1240733&T=6121

This is the story of a man named Clay
And the things he did for the USA
This is the story of a country wide
That sent its Clay to a countryside
That was long and thin, it was cut in two
It was hot as hell and rainy too
Clay was long and thin, only seventeen
And he wore a gun as a young Marine

In Sixty-Nine while Woodstock played
Vietnam had it in for Clay

He left his home when his country called
And he went alone, two tours he hauled
A pack full of memories that were sharp as steel
Like shrapnel wounds that would never heal

'cause Clay took point near the DMZ
He took it for his friends, for you and me
In a war he won on the battleground
But the White House lost, it was never found

Clay returned to a country wide
That was split in two like a great divide
He went to that wall made of polished stone
Where for eighteen months he remained alone

Standing watch, standing guard
Eighteen months but it wasn't hard
As the twenty-four he did in 'Nam
As a Clay Marine for Uncle Sam
Had Semper Fi stamped on his chest
And the men he led were among the best
Now they're dead and gone, names on a wall
Near the iron gates of the White House lawn

That was long ago but the Clay remains
Walking point alone on the western plains
His battles rage nearly every day
Chasing ghosts of war and the NVA

This is the story of a man we lost
In a war we planned but didn't count the cost
To the men like Clay, a quarter-million more
Who made it safely home but never left the war

Hush little baby don't you cry
Nixon will sing you a lullaby
Hush little baby don't say a word
Westmoreland will get you a freedom bird
The Commandant made you a tough Marine
Now Congress will buy you an M-16
Your left, right, left
Your left, right, left
Your left, forever...left