Farewell my wistful Saigon bride   I'm going out to stem the tide   A tide that never saw the seas   It flows through jungles, round the trees   Some say it's yellow, some say red   It will not matter when we're dead      How many dead men will it take   To build a dike that will not break?   How many children must we kill   Before we make the waves stand still?      Though miracles come high today   We have the wherewithal to pay   It takes them off the streets you know   To places they would never go alone   It gives them useful trades   The lucky boys are even paid      Men die to build their Pharaoh's tombs   And still and still the teeming wombs   How many men to conquer Mars   How many dead to reach the stars?      Farewell my wistful Saigon bride   I'm going out to stem the tide   A tide that never saw the seas   It flows through jungles, round the trees   Some say it's yellow, some say red   It will not matter when we're dead