Author: Unknown
Source: found at the Farnsworth TV & Pioneer Museum in Rigby, ID

Take me up to the attic, Dad,
Unlock that dusty trunk;
Show me your soldier uniform,
And all that other junk.
Tell me about the war, Dad
About Radar, Guns, and Jeeps,
About Hitler and Tojo, and Tokyo Rose,
And all those other creeps.
Which side started the war, Dad?
Was our side really the right?
Why don’t men want to talk about it?
Won’t you tell me tonight?

My son someone said, “War is Hell,”
But he was putting it mild,
War is a crying woman;
War is a starving child.
War is your best friend’s guts,
Splattered across your face,
Its rain and snow, and mud and ruts,
In the world’s most lonely places.
War is evil, hatred and death,
Profanity mingled with prayers,
It’s mixed up emotions and mail call
To remind you that someone cares.

It is hoisting Old Glory aloft at dawn,
While the sea pounds away at the rocks
And think of folded flag handed to Mom,
If they should send you home in a box.
War is politics, plunder and greed
It’s a man at his worst or his best,
It’s a nation united in terror and need,
It is womanhood put to the test
Now I can’t tell you all of the story, son,
Nor can the others who served,
Just swallow a lump when flag passes by,
And cherish the freedoms preserved.