The Box

Once upon a time in the land of Hushabye

Around about the wondrous days of yore

They came across a sort of box

Bound up with chains and locked with locks

And labeled, "Kindly do not touch, it's war"

Decree was issued round about all with a flourish and a shout

And a gaily colored mascot tripping lightly on the fore

"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 yore

They didn't try to pick the locks

Or break into that deadly box

They never tried to play about with war

Mommies didn't either, sisters, aunts, grannies neither

'Cause they were quiet and sweet and pretty

In those wondrous days of yore

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 in store

And what was sad and most unfair

Is that it didn't really seem to care

Much who it bumped, or why, or what, or for

It bumped the children mainly, and I'll tell you this quite plainly

It bumps them everyday 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 there's 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 bind the chains and lock the locks

No one seems to want to save the children anymore

Well, that's the way it all appears

'Cause it's been bouncing 'round for years and years

In spite of all the wisdom whizzed since those wondrous days of yore

And the time they came across the box

Bound up with chains and locked with locks

And labeled, "Kindly do not touch, it's war"