Young Once • Track 2
The Boy With A Gun In His Hand
A dark story song about anger, poverty, and how a young life can get pushed into a corner before it has much of a chance.
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About the song
The Boy With A Gun In His Hand is one of the heaviest songs on the album, telling the story of a young life shaped by hardship, grief, and a world that keeps closing in. It is not really about glamour or rebellion at all, more about how damage builds up and how easy it is for hope to run out.
A boy born and raised
Just the son of a working man and his wife
And though they struggled each week to make his wage last
They made it a way of life
These troubled streets
No where to play but all he had known
This is a place where you learn how to fight
You’ve got to make it on your own
Try and understand if you can
His daddy was a poor man
But he was proud and tall he’d stand
A man’s life is fragile
It is ruined so easily these days
And all of the things that he wanted are lost
When they take his work away
He takes a drink
He says I’m just trying to ease’ a my pain
But one’s not enough to lift this heart
Somehow he’s never the same
They took it all even his pride
On the night that his father died
His momma sat alone and cried
For the boy with a gun in his hand
There’s hatred in his heart
The boy with the gun in his hand
Never had a chance from the very start
There never had been much
And now on their own they make do with still less
All that his mother could see in his eyes
Were reflections of her bitterness
He tried so hard
Always looking for ways to give her more
There is no hope in this desperate place
He was reaching out for straws
Turning bad he got hold of a gun
And though he never would use one
When he heard the sirens his young heart sank
For the boy with a gun in his hand
There’s hatred in his heart
The boy with the gun in his hand
Never had a chance from the very start
The man from the press
Asked in the crowd that had gathered around
Someone’s been killed that’s the rumour I’ve heard
Who was the boy that they found
Can you please confirm?
Is it true what I’m told he was only a child?
Although we can’t really say at this time
It’s reported he was armed and wild
He paid the price for breaking the law
Lying lifeless is face on the floor
All hope lost now if it wasn’t before
For the boy with a gun in his hand
There’s hatred in his heart
The boy with the gun in his hand
Never had a chance from the very start