One morning before 5: 15
Before the sun's first rays were seen
Something in the air just seemed to call you
You stepped out in the silent street
And felt the earth beneath your feet
Without a thought of what would soon befall you
The city lay enmeshed in sleep
Had silence ever been this deep
Or was this still a dream of your own making?
In answer came a rumbling sound
As if a moaning from the ground
And all the world around you started shaking
That's when hell broke loose in Frisco (San Francisco)
On a quiet april dawn
And the city fell in ruins all around you
That's the day that nature showed you
That the world we walk upon
Has the power to destroy you and astound you
On Courney Street the workers slept
While down below a young girl wept
In sorrow for the path that she had taken
In China Town the lonely men layed dosed in an opium den
And hoped that from this dream they'd never waken
And from his palace Hotel room, a banker starred into the gloom
And realised that ruin was upon him
While in an alley in the back
A hobo with bindle sack
Lamented the bad luch that had undone him
That's when hell broke loose in Frisco (San Francisco)
On a quiet april dawn
And the city fell in ruins all around you
That's the day that nature showed you
That the world we walk upon
Has the power to destroy you and astound you
As buildings tumbled to the street
The prayers of dying men compete
With groans from underneath the place they'd fallen
The earth itself cries out in pain
It shutters once and once again
And then silent as the God they're calling
And all around the town
The clocks bare silent witness to the chocks
While water mains lie shattered underground
Then someone shouts "Beware the fire!"
And suddenly the flames lead higher
To hungrily devour the fallen town
That's when hell broke loose in Frisco (San Francisco)
On a quiet april dawn
And the city fell in ruins all around you
That's the day that nature showed you
That the world we walk upon
Has the power to destroy you and astound you
A hundred years and more have passed since then
How can it be that I can see what you saw?
Feel what you felt again?
This morning before 5: 15
Before the sun's first rays were seen
Somehow through the years I heard you calling