Welcome Home, Sister

She wears a metal bracelet, oh, so proudly, With a POW’s name upon her arm. She earns her living working in an office, Typing letters and filing all those forms. The girls down at work, they tend to gossip, They talk about her, but not in an unkind way. But all the same, sometimes it gets too personal… On the coffee-break, you ought to hear what the girls say. Welcome home, sister, tell us about Vietnam, Welcome home, sister, tell us all about it, if you can— Now what possessed a girl like you to go over there? Were you running from yourself?—that’s what we heard. Did you go for the thrills, did you go for the men, did you like those uniforms? To carry it on this long, it seems absurd. Yes, I played Country music for the G.I.’s, I made that USO club tour scene. And I rode with body bags in the helicopters… And I saw a night-club blown to smithereens. And yes, I go to D.C. on vacation, I spend a lot of time beside that cold, black wall. I recognize some names upon the surface… Sometimes it feels just like I know them all.