The iron teeth of poverty Now roam this pleasant land They eke away the lifeblood From pleading, stretching hand. Around those dark satanic mills As feline jaws do grip To rip the soul from neath their feet As downward they now slip Hey Dixieman, come take a look Of how the mill did fail How thankless war with Yankee Did poverty prevail Cotton`s King is what they said You`ll never bring it down Can you see all my kinfolk Who starve beneath King`s crown? They sell their chair, and sleeping bed Get rid, of precious book Yet still the iron teeth do bite As sharpened baling hook And iron teeth of poverty Do stalk my land of birth Men once so proud, now fall to knee To scramble in God`s earth Remenber ye, who fight the fight How Lancashire doth cry For Mothers milk, she has no more Her children fade and die And was this war that made it so King Cotton, gone away These men do tramp thru lonely street No work! No food today Tis winter time, and fearful cold We die for lack of food No work today, so beg we must In clothes, so thin, so rude In Liverpool, those merchants fine Grow fat, and run blockade As twenty miles along the road Our mills to waste are laid The iron teeth of poverty Ride rampant thru this land My brothers they are dying But no-one gives a damn Copyright Roy Rawlinson March 17th 2000.