Defiance Ohio – Oh, Susquehanna! lyrics

[Verse 1]
We walk at the paths at the banks of the mighty Susquehanna
With our feet made muddy by your tributaries that trickle their way to the Chesapeake
It's like we follow I-83 down to harbor cities with strip malls and tarmac, people swirling and teeming
It seemed so exciting, but now it seems like such a blight

I grew up near Kentucky's Mt. Zion Road
And all that was there was some old cemetery
All I wanted was to be able to walk to the store
Now I don't live there but there's too many stores, some apartments, and a Sunoco

[Pre-Chorus]
And I wonder, what did they do with the bodies?
And I wonder, what did they do with the bodies?

[Chorus]
Oh, Susquehanna!
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)

[Verse 2]
And I miss that place behind my house where I hiked and climbed and played
Where I ditched this noisy century or just hid out from the decade
M/I Homes thought it could stand to be updated
Forced it all into a grid 'til it looked like the funny pages

With every trace of life, it seems, confined within a frame
The faces move from day to day but the strips all look the same
And the punchlines are resoundingly unfunny
For those trapped in this architecture of easy money

And I feel like this could all come to no good
The kids who populate these cul-de-sacs will never know what stood
Beneath their cookie cutter houses: fields and streams and woods
They'll sit in cars and wait for mom to drive them out of this boring neighborhood

[Chorus]
Oh, Susquehanna!
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)
Oh, Susquehanna!
(We can walk 'most anywhere, but we aren't getting anywhere!)

[Outro]
And I wonder, what did they do with the bodies?
And I wonder, what did they do with the bodies?