TUNES OF GLORY

My father went away and the band played tunes of glory,
A mighty man with ribbons and the devil's dignity,
A regimental sergeant the backbone of the Empire,
For God and righteous glory bound for High Germany.

Sweet Lord, I was just seven when Margaret was eleven.
They served us war for breakfast and the soldier's songs for tea.
"Your father's gone campaigning" was a way of not explaining
That soldiers are the living proof of our inhumanity.

My childhood passed away 'mid tales and lurid stories
Of manufactured glories and inhuman gallantry.
I asked when war is over but no one deemed to answer me,
And Margaret played that bloody tune called High Germany.

My father he came home, but he came without his reason,
Two eyes of molten madness, a senseless fool of war.
"He's just a child," my mother cried, "to be dressed in full regalia
And paraded as a soldier bold from high Germany."

HTML line breaks added. --JoeClone, 13-May-02.