May Day 2

The story begins with the principle characters, Lucy Parsons and her husband Albert. He was a civil war veteran who had become a union printer. He met Lucy Gonzalez in Waco, Texas. She was a seamstress and a thinker in common with Albert's views of social and political structures. Gonzalez was of varied ancestry, not only was she a mixed-blood African-American in the south but her other lineages were Mexican and indigenous. The bi-racial couple stood out already and on top of that they began publishing subversive literature. They moved away from Texas to Chicago in the early 1870s and found an environment no more welcoming, however they were not so isolated in their views and activism in the large city with its population of working class German immigrants. Once again, the text of this song comes, in part, from the writings and speeches of Albert Parsons and other Chicago anarchists.


CENTER OF THE STORM

up from Waco, where we're not welcome
up from Waco to Chicago
to the center of the storm
to the center of the storm
I said I still see slaves with longer chains
they said leave town or you will hang

you can vote for bread clothes and shelter
you can vote but they won't give you these things
leaders make the laws and live real comfortable
live off you workers like foreign kings

what you produce is no guarantee
toil and pray your time is gold
your time is gold and when you have no means
that's what gets sold, that's what gets sold

I said I still see slaves with longer chains
they said leave town or you will hang