Strange Messengers

I looked upon the book of life Tracing the lines of face after face Looking down at their naked feet Bound in chains bound in chains Chains of leather chains of gold We knew it was wrong but we looked away And paraded them down the colonial streets And that's how they became enslaved They came across on the great ships Mothers separated from their babes Husbands stood on the auction block Bound in chains bound in chains Chains of leather chains of gold Men knew it was wrong but they looked away And led them to toil in fields of white As they turned their necks to a bitter landscape Oh the people I hear them calling Am I not a man and a brother Am I not a woman and a sister History sends us such strange messengers They come down through time To embrace to enrage And in their arms even stranger fruit And they swing from the trees With their vision in flames Ropes of leather ropes of gold Men knew it was wrong but they looked away Messengers swinging from twisted rope As they turned their necks to a bitter landscape Oh the people I hear them calling Am I not a man and a brother Am I not a woman and a siste r We will be heard we will be heard