Golden Door

Walking through the desert alone
I find my way by each telephone pole
The land that I'm leaving behind is all that I have known
Dried up dreams and famine fears and now I need a new home...
..In America

Woman I love, with a baby inside
If I don't work today, tomorrow will they die?
I'll sell my soul, I'll sell my rights I'll sell my dignity
But I can't lay my head down, or look up and pray now, until they're safe with me...
...In America

I see them watching, with fear in their eyes
A rich man, guarding all the pieces of his pie
He says, "Go home, get lost, shove off -- ship out, or go to Hell!"
Words that hurt, and hate, and cut, and kill so well...
...From America

Last night sleeping, in my restless dreams
A blue-stone lady, and she's talking to me
She says, "I've watched them coming for a hundred years or more
And I don't care how you crossed, what you lost, tempest tossed on my shore
You're not alone, so welcome home, I lift my lamp for you

Beside the golden door...of America
Beside that golden door...of America

And her promise reaches out across the oceans and across the deserts
The same yesterday, today, and forever:

"Give me your tired, your poor --
Your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore
Send these, the homeless, the tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door"

...of America.