ANZAC Day

Today our friends in Australia and New Zealand remember those who fought and died at Gallipoli during the First World War. Patriactionary remembers by posting this video and lyrics...

Now when I was a young man, I carried me pack,
And I lived the free life of a rover
From the Murray’s green basin to the dusty outback,
Well, I waltzed my Matilda all over.

Then in 1915 my country said Son,
It’s time you stopped rambling, there’s work to be done.
So they gave me a tin hat, and they gave me a gun,
And they marched me away to the war.

And the band played Waltzing Matilda,
As the ship pulled away from the quay
And amidst all the cheers,
the flag-waving and tears,
we sailed off to Gallipoli.

And how well I remember that terrible day,
How our blood stained the sand and the water
And of how in that hell that they called Suvla Bay,
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter.

Johnny Turk he was waiting, he’d primed himself well
He shower’d us with bullets, and he rained us with shells
And in five minutes flat, he’d blown us all to hell
Nearly blew us right back to Australia.

But the band played Waltzing Matilda,
When we stopped to bury our slain,
We buried ours, and the Turks buried theirs,
Then we started all over again.

And those that were left, well we tried to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire
And for ten weary weeks, I kept myself alive,
Though around me the corpses piled higher

Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head,
And when I woke up in my hospital bed,
And saw what it had done, well I wished I was dead.
Never knew there were worse things than dyin’.

For no more I’ll go waltzing Matilda,
All around the green bush far and free
To hump tent and pegs, a man needs both legs
No more waltzing Matilda for me.

So they collected the crippled, the wounded, the maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia.
The armless, the legless, the blind, the insane,
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla

And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay,
I looked at the place where me legs used to be.
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me
To grieve, to mourn and to pity.

And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway.
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared,
Then they turned all their faces away.

And now every April, I sit on me porch
And I watch the parade pass before me.
And I see my old comrades, how proudly they march,
Reliving old dreams of past glories

And the old men march slowly, old bones stiff and sore.
The tired old heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask, “What are they marching for?”
And I ask myself the same question.

But the band plays Waltzing Matilda,
And the old men still answer the call
But as year follows year,
more old men disappear.
Some day no one will march there at all.

Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who’ll come a waltzing Matilda with me?
And their ghosts may be heard as they march by that billabong
Who’ll come-a-waltzing Matilda with me?

Lord, let us always fight for what is right, but never forget the horrors of war. Amen.