The Home Front

Father mows the lawn and mother peels potatoes Grandma lays the table alone And adjusts a photograph of the unknown soldier In this Holy of Holies, the Home And from the TV an unwatched voice Suggests the answer is to plant more trees The scrawl on the wall says what about the workers And the voice of the people says more salt please Mother shakes her head and reads aloud from the newspaper As Father puts another lock on the door And reflects upon the violent times that we are living in While chatting to the wife beater next door If paradise to you is cheap beer and overtime Home truths are easily missed Something that every football fan knows It only takes five fingers to form a fist And when it rains here It rains so hard But never hard enough to wash away the sorrow I'll trade my love today for a greater love tomorrow The lonely child looks out and dreams of independence From this family life sentence Mother sees but does not read the peeling posters And can't believe that there's a world to be won But in the public schools and in the public houses The Battle of Britain goes on The constant promise of jam tomorrow Is the New Breed's litany and verse If it takes another war to fill the churches of England Then the world the meek inherit, what will it be worth Mother fights the tears and father, his sense of outrage And attempts to justify the sacrifice To pass their creed down to another generation 'Anything for the quiet life' In the Land of a Thousand Doses Where nostalgia is the opium of the age Our place in History is as Clock watchers, old timers, window shoppers. Father mows the lawn and Mother peels potatoes Grandma lays the table alone Where's that photograph of the unknown soldier In this Holy of Holies, the Home Father mows the lawn and Mother peels potatoes Grandma lays the table alone Where's that photograph of the unknown soldier In this Holy