7-Day Wayback Music Challenge: Day 5 ~ Billy Bragg - Everywhere (91)

This will always be a special song for me in my life. There is so much meaning in the song for anyone who has a soul. Anyone who has ever went to war. Anyone who has known someone who went to war. Anyone who has ever lived during war in a country where people were singled out. Anyone who ever lost a friend during a time of unrest. Anyone who ever witnessed injustice based on race. It is a pretty powerful so to me, tears stream down my cheek as I listen to it and write this today. 

I was introduced to this song by my older brother after our family had moved away and he stayed behind to get married and start his adult life. He was a huge R.E.M. fan and I was too. There was a track on the same album that was done with Mike Stipe from R.E.M. so my brother bought it an mailed me the CD.

This song reminds me of four generations in my family. My Grand Father who served, my Father who served, my brothers who served and our son who serves now. Not everyone has the same experience in the military and many men who leave and go off to war never return home. Some either don't come back at all physically or just as bad they don't come back mentality.   

 

Dig in boys for an extended stay
Those were the final orders to come down that day
Waiting to be saved in the Philippines
You'll wait forever for the young Marines
Now I believe to be here is right
But I have to say I'm scared tonight
Crouching in this hole with a mouth full of sand
What comes first the country or the man
Look at those slanted eyes coming up over the hill
Catching us by surprise, it's time to kill or be killed
Over here, over there, it's the same everywhere
A boy cries out for his mama before he dies for his home
All my life I wanted to be
As clever and strong as my best friend Lee
We grew up together along Half Moon Bay
Lee was Japanese, born in the USA

When Tommy was fighting Jerry along the River Seine
Me and Lee wanted to do the same
Then they bombed Pearl Harbor at the break of day
I was headed for these islands while Lee was hauled away
They said look at his slanted eyes, he's guilty as guilty can be
Sent here as enemy spies to sabotage the Land of the Free
I never got home, my platoon was never saved
That little fox hole became my island grave
Lee got out of jail but a prisoner he remained
Till he ended his own life to lose that ball and chain
And they said Oh Little Slanted Eyes can't you forgive and forget
And he said, Oh Mr Friendly Ghost
Can you catch water in a net?

Thanks @ruth-girl for the nomination and now the next person to join in on the fun @warpedpoetic