They say he didn't have an enemy
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His was a greatness to behold
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He was the last surviving progeny
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The last one on this side of the world
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He measured half a mile from tip to tail
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silver and black with powerful fins
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They say he could split a mountain in two
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That's how we got the Grand Canyon
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Last Great American Whale [x4]
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Some say they saw him at the Great Lakes
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Some say they saw him off the coast of Florida
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My mother said she saw him in Chinatown
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but you can't always trust your mother
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Off the Carolinas the sun shines brightly in the day
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The lighthouse glow ghostly there at night
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The chief of a local tribe had killed a racist mayor's son
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and he'd been on death row since 1958
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The mayor's kid was a rowdy pig
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spit on Indians and lots worse
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The old chief buried a hatchet in his head
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life compared to death for him seemed worse
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The tribal brothers gathered in the lighthouse to sing
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and tried to conjure up a storm or rain
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The harbor parted and the great whale sprang full up
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and caused a hugh tidal wave
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The wave crushed the jail and freed the chief
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The tribe let out a roar
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The whites were drowned
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the browns and reds set free
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but sadly one thing more
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Some local yokel member of the NRA
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kept a bazooka in his living room
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and thinking he had the chief in his sight
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blew the whale's brains out with a lead harpoon
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Last Great American Whale [x4]
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Well Americans don't care for much of anything
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land and water the least
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And animal life is low on the totem pole
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with human life not worth more than infected yeast
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Americans don't care too much for beauty
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They'll shit in a river, dump battery acid in a stream
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They'll watch dead rats wash up on the beach
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and complain if they can't swim
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They say things are done for the majority
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Don't believe half of what you see, and none of what you hear
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It's a lot like what my painter friend Donald said to me
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"Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over, they're done"
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Last Great American Whale
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Lou Reed |