He is straight as a corkscrew.

He is white as a black cat’s foot at midnight.

The tongue of a man is tied on this,

On the liar who lies to nations,

The liar who lies to the people.

The tongue of a man is tied on this

And ends: To hell with ’em all.

To hell with ’em all.

It’s a song hard as a riveter’s hammer,

Hard as the sleep of a crummy hobo,

Hard as the sleep of a lousy doughboy,

Twisted as a shell-shock idiot’s gibber.

The liars met where the doors were locked.

They said to each other: Now for war.

The liars fixed it and told ’em: Go.

Across their tables they fixed it up,

Behind their doors away from the mob.

And the guns did a job that nicked off millions.

The guns blew seven million off the map,

The guns sent seven million west.

Seven million shoving up the daisies.

Across their tables they fixed it up,

The liars who lie to nations.

And now

Out of the butcher’s job

And the boneyard junk the maggots have cleaned,

Where the jaws of skulls tell the jokes of war ghosts,

Out of this they are calling now: Let’s go back where we were.

Let us run the world again, us, us.

Where the doors are locked the liars say: Wait and we’ll cash in again.

So I hear The People talk.

I hear them tell each other:

Let the strong men be ready.

Let the strong men watch.

Let your wrists be cool and your head clear.

Let the liars get their finish,

The liars and their waiting game, waiting a day again

To open the doors and tell us: War! get out to your war again.

So I hear The People tell each other:

Look at today and tomorrow.

Fix this clock that nicks off millions

When The Liars say it’s time.

Take things in your own hands.

To hell with ’em all,

The liars who lie to nations,

The liars who lie to The People.

Threes

I was a boy when I heard three red words

a thousand Frenchmen died in the streets

for: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity—I asked

why men die for words.

I was older; men with mustaches, sideburns,

lilacs, told me the high golden words are:

Mother, Home, and Heaven—other older men with

face decorations said: God, Duty, Immortality

—they sang these threes slow from deep lungs.

Years ticked off their say-so on the great clocks

of doom and damnation, soup and nuts: meteors flashed

their say-so: and out of great Russia came three

dusky syllables workmen took guns and went out to die

for: Bread, Peace, Land.

And I met a marine of the U.S.A., a leatherneck with a girl on his knee for a memory in ports circling the earth and he said: Tell me how to say three things and I always get by—gimme a plate of ham and eggs—how much?—and—do you love me, kid?