The House I Live In

I'm just one of hundreds of millions of people who carry in our hearts

A profound affection, respect, and lasting sense of loss for John FitzGerald Kennedy

I dearly wish that I could find more ways to live those words of his

"Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country"

But, whatever I try to give to my country it keeps giving right back to me

Compounded every hour on the hour

Only in America could all that's happened to me, happen to a guy like me

Anywhere else I might have wound up digging coal

Or herding sheep or stuffing fortune cookies

All respectable enough jobs but I imagine, for me, a bit frustrating

My country has let me sing for my supper and then payed me for the food I eat

I've had my ups and downs, but who hasn't?

But my low down downdest was certainly better than digging post holes

For the iron or bare bull curtain, and you'd better believe me buster

What is America to me?

A name, a map, a flag I see

A certain word, democracy

What is America to me?

The house I live in

A plot of earth, a street

The grocer and the butcher

And the people that I meet

The children in the playground

The faces that I see

All races and religions

That's America to me

A place I work in

A worker by my side

A little town or city

Where my people lived and died

The howdy and the handshake

The air of feeling free

And the right to speak my mind out

That's America to me

The things I see about me

The big things and the small

The little corner newsstand

And the house a mile tall

The wedding and the churchyard

A laughter and the tears

And the dream that's been a growing

For a hundred and eighty years

The town I live in

The street, the house, the room

Pavement of the city

Or a garden all in bloom

The church, the school, the clubhouse

The millions lights I see

But especially the people

That's America to me