Lyrics of 'Better Things' by Karine Polwart

Ten thousand years of big ideas
Distilled into a billion fears
A grand design, a shiny rocket
A bullet in a bully's pocket

So mesmerized by particles
We disregard the articles
The ones we wrote to keep the peace
Sullied now in blood and greed and grease

Is this the best that we can do?
Oh I can think of better things, can't you?

With the devil's pitchfork in our hands
We turn the fields of foreign lands
We mine the Gulf, we dig it deeper
We free the serpent from its keeper

Yet these are the hands that fix the bones
The ones that build with sticks and stones
These are the hands that plant the tree
The ones that pull the newborn baby free

Is this the best that we can do?
Oh I can think of better things, can't you?
Oh I can think of better things
That hands can make and hearts can sing

For now we deal with those for whom
A life is but a carnal tomb
In which the darkness holds no power
Neither does the final hour

We may lament the deadly art
Of tiny atoms torn apart
Visions that we can't return
And future fires in which we fear we'll burn

But this is the art of those before
Who found a cure within the core
The noble mind behind the ray
That eased our earthly cares away

Is this the best that we can do?
Oh I can think of better things, can't you?
Oh I can think of better things
That hands can make and hearts can sing
And hearts can sing
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