The House at 21

Words and Music; Geoff Drummond.

For the pioneers who never made the pages of the history books; who never were awarded the Queen's medals and who had a more profound effect on our nations well-being than most of us will ever know.

Dateline... Hallet's Cove S.A

Download this page as a PDF file for A4 Lyric book

 

There's an old bush track that stumbles

from the house down to the street

Twin ruts worn smooth through clay and rock

by passing wheels and feet

and where it meets the asphalt

it takes off on the run

But life goes on, a snail's pace, at Number 21

It stands stout stone and timber with it's rusted roof of iron


A monument to memories of a world long left behind


Adjacent flats that boast their youth, designed to awe and stun


Peer over fences bowed with age at Number 21

 

Chorus: Where an old dray with the wheels gone

Sits askew on forty-four gallon drums

There's hooks at the gate where the halter's hung

for the teams of yesterday

Through peeling paint and a paling slot

comes a glimpse of an acre that time forgot

Where Patterson's curse and Forget-Me-Nots

lie sleeping in the sun

Around the house at 21

 

Across the cobbled carriageway

renovations near complete

A Bluestone stands with doors aghast

at the view across the street

Companion's for a hundred years

Now something must be done

to exorcise that ruffian at Number 21

Chorus:

 

For the church, the pub and the city hall have heeded the decree

that wealth and grace shall be the face we place on history

Now the swells are drawn by the promise of a killing just begun

for the land is worth a fortune now at Number 21

 

But it was those who swung the axe

and drove the post into the earth

That forced a living from this land and added to it's worth

While speculators lined their purse

with silver they had wrung

from those burst hearts of might and main at Number 21

 

Where an old dray with the wheels gone

Sits askew on forty four gallon drums

There's hooks at the gate where the halter's hung

for the teams of yesterday

and those stately homes may stand and cheer

if they tear the old place down

I can't help but think the loss be less

the other way around.

Chorus:

 


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