Billy Bragg

Father mows the lawn and Mother peels the potatoes
Grandma lays the table alone
And adjusts a photograph of the unknown soldier
In this Holy of Holies, the Home
And from the TV an unwatched voice
Suggests the answer is to plant more trees
The scrawl on the wall says what about the workers
And the voice of the people says more salt please
Mother shakes her head and reads aloud from the newspaper
As Father puts another lock on the door
And reflects upon the violent times that we are living in
While chatting with the wife beater next door
If paradise to you is cheap beer and overtime
Home truths are easily missed
Something that every football fan knows
It only takes five fingers to form a fist
And when it rains here it rains so hard
But never hard enough to wash away the sorrow
Ill trade my love today for a greater love tomorrow
The lonely child looks out and dreams of independence
From this family life sentence
Mother sees but does not read the peeling posters
And cant believe that theres a world to be won
But in the public schools and in the public houses
The Battle of Britain goes on
The constant promise of jam tomorrow
Is the New Breeds litany and verse
If it takes another war to fill the churches of England
Then the world the meek inherit, what will it be worth
Mother fights the tears and Father, his sense of outrage
And attempts to justify the sacrifice
To pass their creed down to another generation
Anything for the quiet life
In the Land of a Thousand Doses
Where nostalgia is the opium of the age
Our place in History is as
clock watchers, old timers, window shoppers
[ The Home Front Lyrics ]