Italy was far behind me even if I could be warned
Just a hot-head would-be soldier underage
And half-informed
I’d signed up for Franco’s army
In the Spanish Civil War
Mussolini’s thundering speeches
Like an anvil to my sword
But by the time I’d crawled home
Old enough to have some doubts
Il Duce took my native land
And sold it to the Krauts
The whole north of the country
Gone to pay the Devil’s due
I took a job in Budapest to see the Blue Danube

They had gathered at the river
When into this place I came
From Giorgio to Jorge
I’d never be the same
Raised to rally to the truth I could not well deny
The death-defying logic found in living out a lie

There weren’t many free states left in 1942
The work was hard but legal
And thank God I was no Jew
But when the country’s jack-boot-licking
Leaders came for me
I dodged the labor camps
Inside the Spanish embassy
His Excellency took me in with little left to lose
He’d made himself a nuisance
With his sympathy for Jews
They’d seen him at the brickworks
And beside the eastbound trains
With freshly-printed papers
Showing family links to Spain

But just before the gendarmes
Strung him up for what he did
He vanished from the city
And resurfaced in Madrid
Forgotten in my hiding place
I haunted the halls through
Echoes of the rifles rising up from the Danube

They had chased them to the river
When into this place I came
From Giorgio to Jorge
I’d never be the same
Raised to rally to the truth I could not well deny
The death-defying logic found in living out a lie

An oaken desk a golden pen
And stamps that bore his name
The phone rang for a morning
Then fell silent once again
They’d laid their stores in well -
It would be a week or two
Before I had to weigh the risk
To starve or make a move
The shots along the riverbank
More frequent day by day
As I sat and watched his mirrors
Turn my olive skin to grey
They say that if the shoe fits
It should certainly be worn
The clothes he left all fit me
As if to the manner born

The day I stepped outside my thoughts
Went drifting back to Spain
A stranger in that fight
Now it was time to fight again
Distributing the papers that would save them from the war
I signed each one: Jorge Perlasca, Spanish Ambassador

They had left them in the river
When into this place I came
And those along the riverbanks
Would never be the same
Raised to rally to the truth I could not well deny
The death-defying logic found in living out a lie

This story should be told until the Blue Danube runs dry
Of how Giorgio Perlasca dared to question: Why?