Joe Haldeman
Joe Haldeman - The Ballad Of Orbital Hubris lyrics
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They put a colony in space, just to save the human race And they put it in an orbit high and round '[high and round] But the lord's almighty hand said, "This colony won't stand!" And He chuckled as He shoved it to the ground. [CHORUS] And it was sad, Lord, sad. It was sad. It was sad when that colony came down. [In Peoria...] Husbands and wives, little children lost their lives. It was sad when that colony came down. A professor named O'Neill offered us a crazy deal. For just two-hundred-billion he could place... [he could place] An Eden made of rock in a perfect Trojan lock Guaranteed to keep from drifting into space. He had drawn up careful plans to spend 200 million grand To build a spinning donut full of men [full of men] But someone forgot to say, "Those engineers have got to pray!" "Or else Jehovah's gonna want to do 'em in." [CHORUS] Now the Bible says your god is a jealous sort of sod With a careful sense of His prerogatives. [prerogatives] You put a colony in space without even sayin' grace And you really hit Jehovah where he lives. But they took a million tons of lunar dust and Terra's sons And put them in an orbit of Lagrange. [Of Lagrange] (But) said the Lord, "This space is zoned just for vacuum, light, and Stone." "They're gonna wish that they had stayed home on the range." So with a cosmic kind of love, God gave that colony a shove Into an orbit tailored to decay. [to decay] Sixteen times it spun around, and then it crashed into the ground. I'm glad I missed Peoria that day! [CHORUS]