For the men cutting trees at the lake

Well they’ve got a chainsaw
and they know just how to start those
blades a-spinnin’.
Yeah they’ve got a chainsaw
and they’re having a war
that they are winnin’.
They’ve got a fucking chainsaw
and they’re cutting down the juniper
and cedar.
Oh, they’ve got a chainsaw
and they say they’re making the lake
a little safer.

They say the branches will fall
some day, and oh man, then
we’d be sorry.
But the branches are falling today
and they make the cliff-side feel like
a gravel quarry.
But I’ve known some cedar
and I swear those branches were
not quite dyin’.
I don’t know your name or face, sir,
but I think I’m gonna say
that you are lyin’.

Are those bulldozer tracks
right over there, is that
what I see?
Did you need a bulldozer
to run right over
those stumps of trees?
Are those a hundred
slashed trunks just
bleeding sap?
Can you tell me
why you need to do
a thing like that?

There’s sap bleeding
to the ground where
there once was shade.
The bugs swarm to that
sugary blood so
they can mark a grave.
Oh, something lived here
once and it was
tall and brave,
But nothing is so strong
that it need not
fear a blade.

When orders come for
your death, oh no
you can’t be saved.
Instead of spending
your last months lazily,
oh, you should have prayed.
We don’t exactly pray
so we turned to the lake
and in we dove.
Oh, we snaked around the ridgeline,
yeah, and found our freedom
in a cove.

My father says to leave the land
a little better than how
it’s found,
so later we grabbed our things
and I snatched bits of plastic
from the ground.