I wander through each chartered street, where the mighty Thames does flow,
And see in every face I meet: marks of weakness, marks of woe.
In every cry of every man, in every infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban, the mind-forged shackles I hear:
How the chimney-sweeper’s cry, every blackening church appalls,
And the hapless soldier’s sigh runs in blood down palace-walls.
But most, through midnight streets I hear how the youthful harlot’s curse
Blasts the newborn infant’s tear, and blights with plagues the marriage hearse.
Is this a holy thing to see in a rich and fruitful land,—
Babes reduced to misery, fed with cold and usurious hand?
Is that trembling cry a song? Can it be a song of joy?
And so many children poor? It is a land of poverty!
And their sun, it never shines, and their fields are bleak and bare,
And their ways are filled with thorns, it is eternal winter there.
For where’er the sun does shine and where’er the rain does fall,
Babe can never hunger there, nor poverty the mind appall.
Grizzly Bear’s classic debut gets a 15th anniversary vinyl reissue, with a digital companion featuring a bevy of remixes. Bandcamp New & Notable Jan 12, 2020