|
Down by the old stone church |
|
Where the joe-pye weed and the mallows grow |
|
Those petals bigger then my fist |
|
Watch them bob and bow when the wind does blow |
|
There grows a cypress tree |
|
And in its trunk I carved you name |
|
And right beside it I carved mine |
|
They'll give you the hometown hooray |
|
When you come home, baby |
|
Bronze your combat boots |
|
And set your bones in clay |
|
Write down every word you ever had to say |
|
No one wants to believe you died in vain |
|
The first spring that you were gone |
|
The women who lived on the flat roof-tops |
|
Had sherds sewn with quickly germinating seeds of greens |
|
In all of their Sapphic celebrations |
|
They held fires and dances, chanted your name |
|
Tied yellow ribbons round the trunks of trees in town |
|
They'll give you the hometown hooray |
|
When you come home, baby |
|
Bronze your combat boots |
|
And set your bones in clay |
|
Write down every word you ever had to say |
|
With Homeric undertones and half the length |
|
But the skies held a collusion of their own |
|
And on the sunniest day there ever was |
|
You died at the tusk of a bayonet |
|
And Aphrodite found your body |
|
Sprinkled nectar in your wounds |
|
And you blood dripped red anemones |
|
That shimmered just like precious stones |
|
And they floated down the riverbank |
|
To the tributary that now shares your name |
|
And the rapids from then on ran red |
|
They run red to this day |
|
They'll give you the hometown hooray |
|
When you come home, baby |
|
Oh bronze your combat boots |
|
And set your bones in clay |
|
Write down every word you ever had to say |
|
With Homeric undertones and half the length |
|
We used to walk past the blue schoolhouse |
|
We wore our love like it was a crown |
|
And our skin was a map we knew by heart |
|
We never once got lost |
|
We never once got lost |
|
No one wants to believe you died in vain |
|
The Sapphic women who love you so |
|
Still cry every spring when the fennel goes |
|
And the wheat and the barley and the hardy rye |
|
Wither and go to seed |
|
I walk down to the old stone church |
|
Where the joe-pye weed and the mallows grow |
|
Those petals droop now heavy with rain |
|
Watch them bob and bow when the wind does blow |
|
There, my favorite cypress tree |
|
As tall as the steeples I can see |
|
They've tied a yellow-ribbon 'round its trunk |
|
That covers your name where I carved it twice |
|
I rip that ribbon off the tree |
|
Burn it down by the river that now shares your name |
|
Place the ash where the water ravenously licks the riverbank |
|
We used to walk past the blue schoolhouse |
|
We wore our love like it was a crown |
|
And our skin was a map I knew by heart |
|
We never once got lost |
|
We never once got lost |
|
No one wants to believe you died in vain |
