Afternoon Matinee: Protest - Only A Pawn In Their Game

Performed by Bob Dylan

A bullet from the back of a bush

Took Medgar Evers' blood

A finger fired the trigger to his name

A handle hid out in the dark, a hand set the spark

Two eyes took the aim, behind a man's brain

But he can't be blamed

He's only a pawn in their game

A South politician preaches to the poor white man

"You got more than the blacks, don't complain

You're better than them, you been born with white skin"

They explain

And the Negro's name is used, it is plain

For the politician's gain as he rises to fame

And the poor white remains on the caboose of the train

But it ain't him to blame, he's only a pawn in their game

The deputy sheriffs, the soldiers, the governors get paid

And the marshals and cops get the same

But the poor white man's used in the hands of them all like a tool

He's taught in his school from the start, by the rule

That the laws are with him, to protect his white skin

To keep up his hate, so he never thinks straight 'bout the shape that he's in

But it ain't him to blame, he's only a pawn in their game

From the poverty shacks he looks from the cracks to the tracks

And the hoof beats pound in his brain

And he's taught how to walk in a pack, shoot in the back

With his fist in a clinch

To hang and to lynch, to hide 'neath a hood

To kill with no pain like a dog on a chain

He ain't got no name, but it ain't him to blame

He's only a pawn in their game

Today Medger Evers was buried from the bullet he caught

They lowered him down as a king

But when the shadowy sun sets on the one

That fired the gun

You'll see by his grave

On the stone that remains

Carved next to his name, his epitaph plain

"Only a pawn in their game"

~ from Lyric Wiki ~