Yankee Bayonet (I Will Be Home Then)

Soldier: Heart carved tree trunk, Yankee bayonet
A sweetheart left behind

Girl: Far from the hills of the sea-swelled Carolinas
That's where my true love lies

Soldier: Look for me when the sun-bright swallow
Sings upon the birch bough high

Girl: But you are in the ground with the wolves and the weevils
All a-chew on your bones so dry

But when the sun breaks to no more bullets in Battle Creek
Then will you make a grave? For I will be home then
I will be home then
I will be home then
I will be home then
Then

Girl: When I was a girl how the hills of Oconee
Made a seam to hem me in

Soldier: There at the fair when our eyes caught, careless
Got my heart right pierced by a pin

Soldier: But O did you see all the dead of Manassas
All the bellies and the bones and the bile?

Girl: No, I lingered here with the blankets barren
And my own belly big with child

But when the sun breaks to no more bullets in Battle Creek
Then will you make a grave? For I will be home then
I will be home then
I will be home then
I will be home then

Soldier: And stems and bones and stone walls too
Could keep me from you
This skein of skin is all too few
To keep me from you

Solider and Girl: But O my love though our bodies may be parted
Though our skin may not touch skin
Look for me with the sun-bright sparrow
I will come on the breath of the wind