• Hello, Mister Preacher,
    I'm a Prophet from the East,
    Gotta read you a letter
    From the soldiers out at sea

    Now I know that times are tough,
    and this letter ain't so hot,
    But you really have to read
    or them soldiers gonna rot

    It says you gotta do
    what them soldiers told you to
    keep in mind that they're our brothers,
    sisters, everything to you.

    Gotta pull em out of I-ra-qi,
    Send em back home to their family,
    So that they can smoke a burnin' stick
    with my man up North, jolly old Saint Nick

    An' open them presents beneath the tree
    See his three-year-old, bounce him on his knee
    Say he loves him, never gonna let him be
    'Fore he dies for a cause that he didn't believe.

    You can go with this,
    but if you'd really rather not
    gotta stand by what you live,
    gotta live with what you've got

    I guess I can paint a picture for you
    Lotsa colors, but mostly Red, White, and Blue
    The story of a Major, L. E. Grant
    And the bullet holes that let him feed the plants

    He was just twenty-two,
    and a father, still brand new,
    when duty called him out
    and sent him after 'Sama, too.

    He went out into battle
    with a rifle in his hands,
    and when he came back to us
    he brought back an Army band.

    Now the mother has no money,
    and the baby's got no father,
    and the government said nothing
    'cuz they didn't want to bother.

    It's stories like these
    told again and again
    that always keep me asking
    "Should I ever hear again?"

    So, bring them soldiers back real quick,
    Give 'em a quick light with my friend Saint Nick,
    Let 'em see their kids, make the good times last
    Or our people's lives will be broken fast.