Up on 130th Street
Where Frederick Douglass stood tall
Louanne is looking for something to eat
In the trash stacked `gainst the wall
His is the name on the boulevard sign
Who he is, she can't recall
Must be some shrewd politician's design
To get the Black vote, that's all

Time Comes
When what's long been fermenting
And festering ’s all that survives

Time Comes
When the rock that's preventing
What's risen gets driven aside

Over the old Willis Avenue Bridge
She drags her body each day
Out from the tenement where she still lives
Burned out for what insurance could pay
Now she gets told that on top of all this
The reason she's doomed to decay
Is some kind of `Bell Curve' that just can't be fixed
In any affirmative way

Time Comes
When what's long been fermenting
And festering 's all that survives

Time Comes
When the rock that's preventing
What's risen gets driven aside

Out from the bags on the boulevard comes
Anything redeemable
Newspapers boldly proclaiming "Black bums
Have all the White bred jobs filled
Top educated men eating the crumbs...
Congress considering a bill
Louanne discards them all each one by one
Into the fire she's built