Lyrics Handicap And Equality - Peter Hammill

Handicap And Equality

All men are born equal at the moment they arrive:
Check the limbs and senses we require to survive
But some come deaf and dumb and blinded
Some have damage to their brains;
Parents constantly reminded
That they’ll never play the normal children’s games
They may not be normal
But they’re people just the same
If Christ had been born defective
To fulfil the Father’s plan
Would he be as easily accepted as God made man
Or does the human value alter
In the crippled human frame?
Though the tongue and fingers falter
Must we shut them out and shut them up
And shut the case and whisper «such a shame»
That’s how we shut them away
Most of us are lucky
Free from accidents at birth
But their victims share our right
To the inheritance of earth
For all their grunts, their stumps, their tumours
Their eternal wheelchairs
We’re the freaks, we’re the inhumans
If we close our eyes and turn aside
Pretend that if we do they’ll not be there…
They’ve got to face it, so we’ve got to face it
Still, they’ve got to live with it
In a world we supposedly share