One Way - The Levellers

There’s only one way of life

And that’s your own

My father when I was younger

Took me up on to the hill

That looked down on the city smog

Above the factory spill

He said this is where I come

When I want to be free

Well he never was in his lifetime

But these words stuck with me

I ran from all of this

And I climbed that highest hill

And looked down on my life

Beneath the factory spill

I looked down onto my life

As the family disgrace

Then to all my friends on the starting line

Their wages off to chase

And all my friends and all their jobs

And all the bloody waste

I grew up, learned to love and laugh

Circled A’s on the underpass

But the noise we thought would never stop

Died a death as the punks grew up

And we choked on our dreams

We wrestled with our fears

Running through the heartless concrete streets

Chasing our ideas

And the problems of the world

Won’t be solved by this guitar

And they won’t stop coming either

By the life I’ve had so far

And the bright lights of my home town

Won’t be getting any dimmer

Though their calling has receded now

Like some old distant singer

And they don’t seem so appealing

To the eyes of this poor sinner