Hands of the Craftsman Lyrics

Minutes ago as God measures time

Something manlike emerged from primordial slime

Ever since, Mother Nature has been on the run

From a hand with four fingers and opposable thumb

That hand learned to grip, then it learned to shape

Flint into a weapon, then a tool to shape

To build and to kill, and around then it learned

To strike sparks to bring fire and lighten man's world

The hands of the craftsman have moulded our world

From the first stone axe to the first steam drill

To the harvester, laser, and silicon chip

But the hands of the craftsman are losing their grip

The years roll on swift with the birth of the wheel

Man learned to work bronze, then iron and steel

The bow drill, the pole lathe, the compass, the lock

The lens, the sextant, the lantern, the clock

Castings and mouldings, extrusions and pressings

The bandsaw, the dropforge, the milling machine

The tools and the skills have changed through the centuries

The crafts and the knowledge, but seldom the dreams

The builder could turn his hand to most trades

Masonry, joinery, plumbing and all

The engineer trained on a score of machines

Now it's often just one – he's in luck if it's more

Modularization's the name of the game

It means that they put you on just one machine

One or two operations on just the one part

It's efficient, but de-skilling's what it means

One day we're skilled men, the next, operators

The next, no-one knows if we'll be there at all

The art passes into the programmer's hands

Tomorrow, machines will service themselves

The glazier, the bellfounder, printers and knappers

Dyers and weavers, some are already lost

Prefabrication will see out the tiler

As the thatcher before him learned to his cost

The paviour, the saddler, the cooper, the wheelwright

Fitters and grinders and turners and smiths

We all take our turn in the pattern of process

And one by one, we're taking our leave