Dress Blues

Album: Jekyll + Hyde (2015)
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  • What can you see from your window?
    I can't see anything from mine
    Flags on the side of the highway
    And scripture on grocery store signs
    Maybe eighteen was too early
    Maybe thirty or forty is too
    Did you get your chance to make peace with the man
    Before he sent down his angels for you?

    Mamas and grandmamas love you
    'Cause that's all they know how to do
    You never planned on the bombs in the sand
    Or sleeping in your dress blues

    Your wife said this all would be funny
    When you came back home in a week
    You'd turn twenty-two and we'd celebrate you
    In a bar or a tent by the creek
    Your baby would just about be here
    Your very last tour would be up
    But you won't be back. They're all dressing in black
    Drinking sweet tea in styrofoam cups

    Mamas and grandmamas love you
    American boys hate to lose
    You never planned on the bombs in the sand
    Or sleeping in your dress blues

    Now the high school gymnasium's ready
    Full of flowers and old legionnaires
    Nobody showed up to protest
    They just sniffle and stare
    But there's red, white, and blue in the rafters
    And there's silent old men from the corps
    What did they say when they shipped you away
    To give all in some God awful war?

    Nobody here could forget you
    You showed us what we had to lose
    You never planned on the bombs in the sand
    Or sleeping in your dress blues

    No, no you never planned on the bombs in the sand
    Or sleeping in your dress blues
    You never planned on the bombs in the sand
    Or sleeping in your dress blues Writer/s: Jason Isbell
    Publisher: Downtown Music Publishing, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
    Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

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