David Rovics - The Commons lyrics

First you told us only through you could we know God And if we dared to question then He wouldn't spare the rod For you we worked the soil, for you we dug the moors For you we shed our blood and fought so many pointless wars And now you build your fences and say there's nothing we can do You say the world around us belongs fairly to the few But about six billion people no doubt will agree This world is our home, not your property It's the commons, our right of birth And to you who would enclose the land all around the Earth Our future is your downfall, when we cut this ball and chain You who'd sacrifice the public good for your private gain With our sweat we built the railroads, built cities on these shores But because you own the money you say that it's all yours We laid the phone lines and the pipelines and then right before our eyes You say these things our taxes paid for you now will privatize Privatize the hospitals, privatize the schools Privatize the prisons for all those who break your rules And preparing for the day when all the wells run dry You say you own the very rain that falls down from the sky But it's the commons, our right of birth And to you who'd own the water all around the Earth Our future is your downfall, when we cut this ball and chain You who'd sacrifice the public good for your private gain You claim to own the harvest with your terminator seeds You claim to own the genomes of every animal that breeds You claim to own our culture and the music that we play And with every song we download to your coffers we must pay You would even own my name and you say it's for the best Maybe you'll let us on your radio stations if our songs can pa** your test You own country, you own western, you say you've given us a choice You may own the airwaves but you'll never own my voice It's the commons, our right of birth And to you who'd own the music all around the Earth Our future is your downfall, when we cut this ball and chain You who'd sacrifice the public good for your private gain It's the commons, our right of birth And to you who would own everything all around the Earth Our future is your downfall, when we cut this ball and chain You who'd sacrifice the public good for your private gain