John Raymond Pollard: Lyrics & Listen
Bar-Sinister
(John Raymond Pollard)
January 31, 2007
John R. Pollard
My mother pleasured merchants as they traveled ‘cross the land.
My father was a highway man by victims cursed and damned.
A babe born out of wedlock lives a life of misery.
My name bears the bar sinister for everyone to see.
I vow that it is so.
And on and on we go.
A bastard has no place among nobility they say.
They need me though to shovel shit and dig a proper grave.
And of a bastard’s outcast life no troubadour does sing.
This child’s teeth are set on edge for lack of wedding ring.
I vow that it is so.
And on and on we go.
The other day an addled Prince was walking by the graves.
The poor soul seemed distracted for I heard what he did say
While talking to a stinking skull he held in his fine hand.
He seemed yet less than you or I, not someone I’d call grand.
I vow that it is so.
And on and on we go.
I vow that it is so.
And on and on we go.
My life had gone unnoticed, now you hear what I do say
Because young Willie Shakespeare wrote me in to his new play.
My back does cave; my teeth do rot, but what remains unchanged
Is the stain of bar sinister that scars my fractured name.