(Lyrics by Lucy Kaplansky and Richard Litvin,
Music by Lucy Kaplansky)


Late afternoon back in New York town
Waking up as the wheels touch down
Pick up my guitar and walk away

Wish I was going home to stay

Line of taxis, I wait my turn

Tar and asphalt, exhaust and fumes
Beside the road on a patch of ground
Taxi drivers are kneeling down


Beneath the concrete sky I watch them pray
While the people of the world hurry on their way

I think they're praying for us all today
And the stories that fell from the sky that day


CHORUS:
This is the land of the living
This is the land that's mine

She still watches over Manhattan
She's still holding onto that torch for life


Back home fire's still burning, I can see it in the air
Pictures of faces posted everywhere
They say "hazel eyes, chestnut hair

Mother of two missing down there"

I pass the firemen on duty tonight

Carpets of flowers in candlelight
And thank you in a child's scrawl
Taped to the Third Street firehouse wall


There's shadows of the lost on the faces I see
Brothers and strangers on this island of grief

There's death in the air but there's life on this street
There's life on this street


CHORUS
This is the land of the living
This is the land that's mine

She still watches over Manhattan
She's still holding onto that torch for life


Then I got in a taxi, said "Hudson Street please"
He started the meter and he looked at me
I glanced at his name on the back of his seat

And I looked out the window at the ghost filled streets

I noticed cuts on his hand and his face

And I said "You're bleeding, are you okay?"
He said "I'm not so good, got beat up today
And I'm not one of them no matter what they say


I'm just worried about my family
My wife's in the house and she's scared to leave"

And I didn't know what to say
I didn't know what to say
But I said a prayer for him anyway


CHORUS
This is the land of the living

This is the land that's mine
She still watches over Manhattan
She's still holding onto that torch for life