Bummer Lyrics - Singles - Harry Chapin

His mama was a midnight woman 

His daddy was a drifter drummer 

One night they put it together 

Nine months later came the little black bummer 

He was a laid back lump in the cradle 

Chewing the paint chips that fell from the ceiling 

Whenever he cried he got a fist in his face 

So he learned not to show his feelings 

He was a pig-tail puller in grammer school 

Left back twice by the seventh grade 

Sniffing glue in Junior High 

And the first one in school to get laid 

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He was a weed-speed pusher at fifteen 

He was mainlining skag a year later 

He'd started pimping when they put him away 

In jail he changed from a junkie to a hater 

And just like the man from the precinct said: 

"Put him away, you better kill him instead. 

A bummer like that is better of dead 

Someday they're gonna have to put a bullet in his head." 

They threw him back on the street, he robbed an A & P 

He didn't blink at the buddy that he shafted 

And just about the time they would have caught him too 

He had the damn good fortune to get drafted 

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He was A-One bait for Vietnam, you see they needed more bodies in a hurry 

He was a cinch to train cause all they had to do 

Was to figure how to funnel his fury 

They put him in a tank near the D M Z 

To catch the gooks slipping over the border 

They said his mission was to Search and Destroy 

And for once he followed and order 

One sweat-soaked day in the Yung-Po Valley 

With the ground still steaming from the rain 

There was a bloody little battle that didn't mean nothing 

Except to the few that remained 

You see a couple hundred slants had trapped the other five tanks 

And had started to pick off the crews 

When he came on the scene and it really did seem 

This is why he'd paid those dues 

It was something like a butcher going berserk 

Or a sane man acting like a fool 

Or the bravest thing that a man had ever done 

Or a madman blowing his cool 

Well he came on through like a knife through butter 

Or a scythe sweeping through the grass 

Or to say it like the man would have said it himself: 

"Just a big black bastard kicking ass!" 

And just like the man from the precinct said: 

"Put him away, you better kill him instead. 

A bummer like that is better of dead 

Someday they're gonna have to put a bullet in his head." 

When it was over and the smoke had cleared 

There were a lot of V C bodies in the mud 

And when the rescued men came over for the very first time 

They found him smiling as he lay in his blood 

They picked up the pieces and they stitched him back together 

He pulled through though they thought he was a goner 

And it force them to give him what they said they would 

Six purple hearts and the Medal of Honor 

Of course he slouched as the chief white honkey said: 

"Service beyond the call of duty" 

But the first soft thought was passing through his mind 

"My medal is a Mother of a beauty!" 

He got a couple of jobs with the ribbon on his chest 

And though he tried he really couldn't do 'em 

There was only a couple of things that he was really trained for 

And he found himself drifting back to 'em 

Just about the time he was ready to break 

The V A stopped sending him his checks 

Just a matter of time 'cause there was no doubt 

About what he was going to do next 

It ended up one night in a grocery store 

Gun in hand and nine cops at the door 

And when his last battle was over 

He lay crumpled and broken on the floor 

And just like the man from the precinct said: 

"Put him away, you better kill him instead. 

A bummer like that is better of dead 

Someday they're gonna have to put a bullet in his head." 

Well he'd breathed his last, but ten minutes past 

Before they dared to enter the place 

And when they flipped his riddled body over they found 

His second smile frozen on his face 

They found his gun where he'd thrown it 

There was something else clenched in his fist 

And when they pried his fingers open they found the Medal of Honor 

And the Sergeant said: "Where in the hell he get this?" 

There was a stew about burying him in Arlington 

So they shipped him in box to Fayette 

And they kind of stashed him in a grave in the county plot 

The kind we remember to forget 

And just like the man from the precinct said: 

"Put him away, you better kill him instead. 

A bummer like that is better of dead 

Someday they're gonna have to put a bullet in his head."