You put on your best dress that morning;
Your smile was like the timid glow
Of dawn’s first golden breath, and though
You thought no one was watching, I saw
You dancing through the garden singing
“Papa will be home today.”

And I was happy too, you know,
I missed those carefree summer days
Sitting on the mossy banks of Coover Creek
Beneath the oak leave’s iridescent shade
The two of us, with lines cast on the gloomy flow
To chase the shifting, darting shapes
Among the rocks and weeds.

Or the cozy winter nights we spent
Before the fire’s fiercely warming glow,
Setting up our armies for attack:
Long lines of wooden men
Arranged across the parlor floor
To go to war, just like Papa.

And when he finally stepped off of the train,
I ran across the wooden boards
And threw my arms around his ragged coat;
Though, looking back, I saw you were afraid,
And hid in Mama’s skirts until you saw
His sunken eyes and tired, wounded smile,
And then you ran to hug him too.

He picked you up; you never knew
That even he could hug so hard
And even though his face was scarred
He still remembered you – his little girl;
And cried such tears from all the nights
He must have thought of you while shells flew overhead.

And so we thought that all was finally right;
With Papa home old days would be the same,
Old dreams would reappear; what it became
Was different, though, we found
In just two nights, when he began to scream
And Mama cried, and so did you;
But I was too afraid, and hid my tears.

Then later on, I saw you watching through
The little window right above your bed:
Him pacing back and forth beneath the moon
And crouching low behind the garden wall
As if to sleep with haunted dreams where enemies are near;
You cried yourself to sleep.

But what you didn’t see was later on,
When he came back inside with broken eyes
And hung his rugged coat behind the door,
And Mama went and stood there by his side
And put her arms around him like she used to do:
He put his arms around her and they cried
And stood there while the evening lamp burned slowly on.