Pretty Boy and the Gunpowder
Words and Music by Bobby Angel
January 2, 2022
Your gunpowder didn’t blow And so went on your way Past the trail where the train once ran Beside a bridge that’s washed away Weren’t you the next big thing As guaranteed as anything And now look at you today Ruins overrun
Such a pretty boy you were Born in Jerusalem Spinning water at your wheel Into rifles for the coming war Outfitting old Henry’s fort Farther down the Locust Point Where cannons kept the ships at bay And sent them in retreat
High above the eagles soared As bulldozers built the wall For pretty boy to fill its banks To divert it all to city streets An edict of the ruling crown And so you laid your rifle down Surrender your powder To the dreams of gasoline
Over time you silted in And so your dreams slipped away A blessing now looking back How so little things ever changed Farther up he won it all Only somehow to lose Pretty Boy only flows these days To highways of concrete
Gunpowder long since relapsed To a cascade of small rapids Other than logs holding back Waters where beavers swim at night Protected as a county park You can still go there today And listen to a bluegrass play Or walk the covered bridge
Life is good on the old rail trail Long after they all moved away It’s waters never slowed On their steady fall into the bay Pretty boy doesn’t have much to say He just keeps it all inside From a flooded Paper Mill To the Mason Dixon Line
