From the recording Gaia
Lyrics
They came with stories in their hands
Names stitched into pockets
Homes folded into photographs
Gun smoke still in their hair
And some of us just looked at them
Just like the weather
Something to be endured
Not lives that once held laughter
Not futures asking for a door
To just survive
Somewhere along the line
Some of us traded faces for numbers
We concocted
And made a great fear noise
That our future would be eroded
And in so doing
Eroded our humanity
And we are the lesser for it
Thank you Johnny Howard
For leading the charge
That was the moment
Refugees stopped being people
When the world forgot to listen
When the heart forgot its shape
And we floundered
When the word stranger
Became easier than neighbour
So easy to create false rumour and lie
Johhny Coward
Defaming character
And making our fences taller
And their stories we erased
Or changed
Isn’t it convenient
To forget our humanity
When our self-interests
Are at stake
Forget our humanity
Hardly Christ like
Time to expose the truth
We have all learned to scroll past sorrow
All is numb
Just another headline
Just a distant storm
A foreign ache
And not a mother holding her child
Not a father counting footsteps
Across a border of fear
We let distance ease our conscience
Til compassion disappear
Disappears
Unless in this is the moment
We choose to see
Them as the people they are
The people they are
To let their stories enter our hearts
To let the fences bend
To remember that a stranger
Is a neighbour to befriend
Befriend