Em D C B7

The sun beats like a hammer in the south of California

4 cents a sheet at piece work, for the sixty hour week

The subs pushed out the unions, to build the little boxes, 

And hired from the border men to hang the drywall sheets

The border’s not a place; it’s a weight that you carry

It’s a way to keep you quiet, so you don’t get put away

It’s an agent of the boss, with his rifle, always watching

Oversees you when you’re working, comes for you on pay day

 

Chorus

C D Em

When the workers said Ya basta! Enough is enough,
Am B

There was a power there between them that was more than any man

C D Em

You can’t beat it down or gas it, you can’t hold it in your cuffs

Am B

It’s power of people knowing that they can,

Em B7 Em 

Si se puede, si se puede, yes we can

 

Sixty bucks were short on a check for Jesus Gomez

His sweat and body not enough, they even stole his pay

And the foreman laughed and said, we can always find another

Someone else to take your place, so let’s do it the easy way

But he told all his paisanos, his friends from Guanajuato,

How much of our dignity can cheated wages buy?

We’ll gather up our brothers, and we’ll go down to the Carpenters-

Say let us into the union- we’ll organize or die.

 

Chorus

 

The cops at Mission Viejo attacked us on the picket

And would hand you to La Migra if you wouldn’t scab

But we knew that we would win, one way or the other-

And if violence is what they want, then violence they will have

we marched on La Migra, and on the police stations 

And put our bodies on the line, to force their freeways closed

Like a dandelion spreads its seeds whenever you will kick it- 

The harder that they knocked us down, the stronger that we rose

 

Chorus