My Daddy walks away, chin up, standing tall,
And I wonder if he’ll even come back at all.
He says he’s doing this just for me.
But how can that be? I truly don’t see.
Yet there he is, walking away,
But I wish, I wish, wish he could stay.

My mom squeezes my shoulder as I try to understand.
How so many can die because of one man.
My friend’s dad left and never returned.
They say he was found dead and burned.
My heart stops and I think, “That could be me.”
A girl missing someone from her family.

A pale face, and blank, staring eyes,
For me, is proof of my father’s demise.
Dreams at times can seem so true,
And I’m longing for my father’s “I love you.”
Yet every night the dreams come back,
I wake, heart beating a rat-a-tat-tat.

Palms sweaty and clamped, inside my dress.
I;m so worried and so very deeply distressed.
Life is scary, and I wish I could change it,
Or even just to rearrange it.
But what’s a girl to do,
About a war, a war like World War Two?