JOHN R. BLACK

AFGHANISTAN

©2017 music by John R. Black,

words by Alex Cockers, 

℗42nd Street Music Seattle

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Sitting here all alone

Nothing is the same

Putting plan to paper

War is a brutal game

Read what you read

Say what you say

You’ll never understand it

Living day by day

 

(Chorus:)

Oh Afghanistan, you broke my heart

Oh Afghanistan, you wrecked my mind

The soldier you knew before

You will never find

In Afghanistan

In Afghanistan

Oh Afghanistan

Please let me go home

 

Towns have been taken

Innocence is lost

What’s the price for victory

Can we count the cost?

War is never ending

Stakes are too high

Many friends have fallen

Many more will die

 

(Chorus)

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My last day in the desert

last day in the sand

I hope I never come again

to this barren land

Hot days, lonely nights

Many moons have passed

Don’t want this war no more

It’s got to be the last

 

(Chorus)

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Alex Cockers was born in April 1985. He was a Royal Marines Commando from 2005-2009 and served on Operation Herrick and in Hemland Province for a total of fourteen months.

How he came to write his poems: He explains, “During my fourteen months in Afghanistan, I had many feelings and thoughts that I was unable to share with anyone. Under the stars, in the desert, rhymes would manifest in my head. I would write them down, construct them into poems and somehow I felt better for getting them off my chest.”