Silence, nothing else but silence now, am I really dead
No more the sound of cannon fire or smell of rotting dead
Is this the death I feared so long, is this my eternal rest
The grasp of war relinquished now, my duty dispossessed

Incessant rain, falls constantly, to torment and pain my soul
The battlefield a quagmire now, that swallows’ soldiers whole
Thousands, countless thousands of men now dead or dying
Hell, on Earth is Passchendaele, to be its witness, horrifying

I have no sense of being now, my corpse bequeathed of breath,
My soul now purged, awaits its fate to meet the sacrament of death
My dreams of home abandoned now, my weapons cast aside
Now duty paid to God and King, my epitaph epitomised

But from the very brink of death, I feel my pain again
Returning from the heavenly gates, soaked by that ****** rain
Delivered from God’s holy grace to Satan’s gates revived
From the peace of my eternal sleep, my comfort now deprived

Back to Pilckem Ridge once more, to a Flanders blood-soaked trench
Where grey faced lads with bowing heads, sit silent in the stench
Corpses laying side by side, half buried in oozing mud
All faith and hope abandoned, the price now paid in flesh and blood

I prey for the Lord to take me and release me from this hell
Remove me from perdition, reposed in perpetuity to sleep where angels dwell
Let me succumb, dispense with me, undiminished in your grace
Deliver me to eternity and redeem me from this awful place

My headstone stands on hallowed ground, near Tyne Cot, ***** Town
Eternal sleep, my answered prayer, now rest in peace where I lay down
I gave the best that I could give, till I could give no more
Then blessed the Lord that saved my soul, but cursed the ****** war

Mary McDonald stands in her garden and stares at the stars in the sky’s
She thinks of her husband who’s serving in Flanders as teardrops well up in her eyes
She’s holding a rose that has started to whither remembering their wedding day
It’s only four weeks that they bequeathed their vows, now he’s fighting a war far away

Billy McDonald lays in the trenches and thinks of his beautiful bride
Then kisses her letter he reads every hour, imagining her there by his side
He can still smell her perfume and feel her embraces when he held her just one month ago
Recalling his promise that he’d always love her and forever be her lifelong beau

A shout from the Captain resounds through the trenches; the order is passed down the line
Heartbeats start racing as emotions unravel as fears of the moment untwine
This fresh faced young soldier that worked as a mill hand now waits with his pals by his side
In less than one hour he’d return from perdition where most of his buddies had died

The dark winter night air gives Mary a chill as she stands all alone in the cold
She has no way of knowing that Billy lies weeping as his thoughts of the battle unfold
He takes out the letter he’s writing to Mary and kisses the words that he’d penned
It was found in his pocket, still words left unwritten. A letter he never would send


                                  


There’s an unopened letter that stands on the sideboard with a solitary withering rose
The words it contains have never been read; its contents were never disclosed
Now Mary wears black as she stands in her garden and stares at the heavens above
And thinks of her Billy now sleeping forever, her one and her only true love


Mary McDonald stares in the mirror at a face that is ashen and gray
Her anguish reflecting the one she has lost in a land that seems so far away
She was just seventeen when she stood at the altar and married the love of her life
And now she’s his widow, no longer his bride, no longer his lover, and wife.
  
Billy McDonald was only eighteen when he left everything he held dear
He gave his own life that others might live in a world without trouble and fear
Mary remarried and had her own children, a boy and a girl she named Ruth
She called her son Billy, well that’s what I’ve heard and I’m sure they were telling the truth

The other day I heard a noise,
an eeky squeaky tiny voice
And when I searched around the house
I apt to find a little mouse

And as he spoke he said to me
I come from Clacton by the Sea
My name is Pierre Lafayette
and I can play the clarinet

And as we sat there on the floor
he played me “Stranger On the Shore”
Each note he played was smooth as silk,
he sounded just like Acker Bilk

I sat there the whole afternoon
As I listened to each bewitching tune
A true master of the liquorice stick
This maestro rodent cleaver ****

Then in a flash the mouse departed,
but left a stink, I think he’d farted
And all he left was the smell of cheese
From his pungent odious **** breeze

So if you’re sat there in the house
and come across a little mouse
Don’t be scared and start to fret,
it could be Pierre Lafayette.