Something in My Eye: Stories Read Free Page B

still strongly support it is him isn’t it / come give us a kiss and a hug all around / don’t forget me john I’m your sister and I love you / did you see the banner we hung across the lawn the one that said welcome home john we are proud of you the whole state of alabama is proud of you / that uniform is as pristine as the day you left us john it sure is spiffy / I kind of expected it to be speckled with our enemies’ blood john why not / oh of course they let you wash it I wasn’t thinking john forgive me / what was it like over there all we had were our imaginations / we understand you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to but did you get the care packages we sent / your mother worked so hard on those packages john in fact it cost us a fortune to ship all that food even though I tried to explain to her that it wasn’t as if there weren’t grocery stores where you were there were grocery stores weren’t there john / did you get the letters I sent john did you get all those letters from my classmates there were a lot of them / you must have been busy john but we were hoping you would write once in a while but I’m sure you were too busy defending
and spreading freedom but none of that matters because you are home and the army can’t legally force you to return for another tour and now you have some pocket money and college is waiting if that’s what you still want to do / john wants to eat everyone gather around the table while we say a long and thankful prayer

Title: WE DON’T HAVE MUCH MONEY BUT WE HAVE A FAITH CALLED JESUS
    Lyrics: before we all devour we have to give thanks to the man who is responsible for all of our business here who knows when you are sleeping and given to idleness and when you are supremely alert / we don’t have much money never had much money / you could say that economic factors forced you into war but that would deny your individual choice dear john you understand you strong independent man son of mine / I guess you picked up the habit of not praying but just ask your sister she prays by her bedside every night and expects results so I don’t think you can walk in here having forgotten all religion and expect us your dear family to understand when you deny the fact that jesus lord is upon you even when you least expect it / there are some principles which we all share surely you haven’t forgotten the power of shared principles john you know you always carry the blood and beliefs of those who made you don’t you john / I had a good day at school today yes we know honey but john is just freshly home from the war / here john have a piece of this steak you know how poor we are so it isn’t everyday we eat steak but here take a piece of this and put it in your mouth it’s tender isn’t it / john likes that steak you can tell he likes it when he smiles that way / have another piece john you are too thin what did they feed you over there / you did not eat fear john is making a joke come on everyone laugh at john’s joke / it’s been a long time since we laughed in this house but we can laugh again with impunity because our boy the thing we made from scratch is here in the flesh and hungry

Title: THE WORLD IS FULL OF MANY PEOPLE THOUGH WE REMAIN PROUDLY IGNORANT OF WHAT THEY DO
    Lyrics: yes john you can smoke in here your mother quit this year and I pretended to quit at least on account of your sister’s asthma but go right ahead let me get the ashtray / something has been bothering us john now correct me if I’m wrong but your mother and I were thinking that the people you were trying to spread freedom to are people who don’t actually want it and correct me if I’m wrong maybe I was born yesterday but I don’t see how any person wouldn’t want to be free we here in this country take it for granted but you can bet if someone wanted to step in and say no more freedom for you