I’m up in the morning before the sun shines
Gotta be on time to that nine-to-five
Gotta sell my labor to make my pay

I’m standing on the assembly line
They got my body but I got my mind
On a quiet little spot at my favorite lake

‘Cuz I’d rather be fishing
Cracking into some brews
I’d rather be fishing
No boss man telling me what to do
Just fishing
Stretched out on the green green grass
Not clocking in and a-busting my ass
Just to make some fat cat’s surplus value

Well I do the same job as my daddy done
But he had three and I got one
Fellow worker helping lighten that load

And I get the same wage in spite of inflation
My family’s fixing to die of starvation
Thank God for what I can catch in my little boat

Now you may say “hey go to school
If you want higher pay mister, don’t be a fool “
But where you think that tuition money’s coming from?

Cuz I already work sixty hours a week
I’d have to take night classes in my sleep
Plus I’m signed up to chaperone my daughter’s prom

Not out of some paternalistic desire to quote-unquote protect her from the vagaries of teenage romance mind you—as a parent all I can do is hope that I’ve equipped her with the right kind of social and emotional tools to make those choices herself when the time comes. But it’s hard to watch your babies grow up and become their own people in their own right—which is all the more reason to be present in the Here and Now, not sitting in some converted mobile home listening to some underpaid adjunct go on and on about the Pythagorean theorem! And besides...

I’d rather be fishing
Feeling that line to taut
I’d rather be fishing
Not being sold and bought
Not alienated from my labor
Working more than what I’m paid for
Watching the best years of my life go to pot

Well it seems to me there’s one thing to be done:
We gotta seize the means of pro-duc-tion
It’s gonna take all our brawn and all our brains

But there’s more of us than there is of them
Those lazy bosses and their policemen friends
And we got nothing to lose but our chains

Seems to me there’s one thing to do:
Seize the means of production and the government too
Cuz the state just does the bidding of the idle rich

And when we’ve expropriated all the companies
And everybody has just what they need
There’ll be plenty of time for me to just sit and fish

Cuz I’d rather be fishing
Just laying out in the sun
I’d rather be fishing
Knowing that my work is done
Spending my time doing things I love
Not following orders from up above
Waiting on that next paycheck to come