The Paranoid Style - A Marked Man On A Marked Occasion

Hey Derek, will you take a look at this?
Death came early for cousin Chris
Death came early for Aunt Jean
Dublin town, St. Stephen’s Green

Home rule and the Easter Rising
Tipperary and the constabulary
Tom Clarke and the Black and Tans
Don’t fuck with a marked man

A marked man on a marked occasion
Citizen army, guns out blazing
Chopped to pieces, scattered to the wind
You’ll be seeing us again
24 April, 1916
The post office on Sackville Street
Volunteers and Cumann na mBan
Winnie’s got a typewriter and a gun

A marked man stands before his god
Tom Clarke and the firing squad
Dying smiling just because
You can kill a man but you can’t kill his cause

Sound the alarm, send in the troops
Brittania kills anything that moves
Slayed civilians and the police
Ring the bells let the marked man speak:
“Ireland unfree shall never be at peace!”

Padraig Pearse would make the call
Padraig Pearse against the wall
James Connolly, never surrender!
James Connolly tied to a chair

On the third day they rose again
But they were sorely outmanned
By day six it was the end
So goes the story of the marked man

A marked man on a marked occasion
It’s not easy starting a nation
It’s not easy to give away your life
A marked man always pays that price