The Ballad of the Death Row Cafe

The Ballad of the Death Row Cafe

  by Ray McEachern

My name is Tommy Z and I’m longing to be free

But this Death Row Café is as  close as I’ll  be.

Yes I’ve seen 'em come and go in the Death Row Café

More than 60 have been offed and I am still waiting  my day.

It might come tomorrow, or maybe next year

But after 33 years, I'll go without fear

For God knows, and Lawson knows, I shouldn't be here.

My name is Tommy Z and I’m longing to be free

But the Death Row Café is as close as I’ll be.

My story is a long one and the courts, they say I’m done.

No appeals, no relief, just a gurney for one.

But if you’ll  listen just a few, I’ll tell the truth to you

For the events of my life could maybe happen to you.

You see a judge with a grudge has all the legal tools

If he gets you in his courtroom, he'll makes  the rules.

I never would have thought the law could be so easy to bend

When I stood up for what’s right and went to court for a friend

But a judge I'd never met became my executioner that day

When I helped a falsely charged friend, I got a ticket to this café.

Now judges aren't supposed to be witnesses for their friends

But this judge named Paul didn't care about those rules,

Marched right in in his robes and said, "Hey, Mr. Baker there's my friend

But it didn't do him no good, cause Baker lost his job and the case,

My friend kept his bar and Judge Paul, he lost face.

You see my friend, Mr. James, was a black man who owned a bar.

But some good ole boys from the klan, they wanted to take it away.

So a beverage man named Baker walked in the bar one day

And said "I saw you selling drugs, Mr. James so I'm takin your bar away."

But  Mr. James said, "You're lying, and I'll go to court to prove it."

So he asked me to help him and when a friend calls, I do it.    

When Mr. James kept his bar the youknowwhat hit the fan

Judge Paul was mighty angry and so was the klan.

It was only four months later, men broke into my store

And shot me in the stomach and  left me layin on the floor

But when I called the police, they framed me for the crime.

You see my wife and her folks were shot dead in the store

And a black man named Mays was also dead on the floor.

I said, "Mays was onea them who jumped me as I came in the door."  

But the police they said "You're lying" and gave me the blame 

And then that judge with a grudge got my case, oh for shame, for shame!

If that's what you call justice, justice is a bad name.

They lied about the blood on my shirt, said it came from my Mr. Edwards

They said I beat him and then shot him and even showed the jury how.

That prosecutor was lying, but the jury didn't know 

So Judge Paul overruled them and he sent me here to death row.

Thirty years later DNA proved me true,

But they said it didn't matter cause I was there too.

So the last view of freedom that I'll ever see

Is the sight of an eagle flying high and care free

In a picture on the wall that's as close as I'll be.

My name is Tommy Z and I’m longing to be free

But this Death Row Café is as close as I’ll be.