Paul Simon – Can I Forgive Him lyrics

[Verse 1]
I am esmeralda agron, senora
I know I've no right to speak
My son is not the savage boy you see
The cape, the sneer, the slicked-back hair
It hides the child I nursed and bathed, senora
Please don't turn your eyes from me
Your son, gone to god, and mine to blame
My fated son
He too is gone
The state will see to that, I am sure, senora
The state will see to that, I am sure
You spanish people, you come to this country
Nothing here changes your lives
Ungrateful immigrants asking for pity
When all of your answers are knives
This city makes a cartoon of a crime
Capes and umbrellas the glorification of slime
I have to face this horror, senora
My religion
Asks me to pray for the murderer's soul
But I think you'd have to be
Jesus on the cross
To open your heart after such a loss

[Chorus]
Can I forgive him?
Can I forgive him?
No, I cannot
Can I forgive him
No, I cannot

[Bridge]
Friends become strangers
Compassion is hard to express in words
The trembling flowers they bring
Fear in the roots and the stem
What happened to me they know could
Happen to them

[Chorus]
Can I forgive him
No, I cannot
Can I forgive him
No

[Verse 2]
Only god can say 'forgive'
His son too received a knife
But we go on, we have to live
With this cross we call our life
Feels like a bomb fell
And wave after wave come the aftershocks

[2nd Mother]
You can't believe that it's true
There must be some mistake
You drift through this nightmare from which you

[Chorus]
Can't wake
Can I forgive him?
Can I forgive him
No, I cannot

[Outro]
Can t forgive him?
Can I forgive him, no, I cannot
Can I forgive him?
Can 1 forgive him, no, I cannot
Can I forgive him
No, I cannot