When You Meet a Man From Your Own Home Town
Sing, O Muse, in treble clef,
A little song of the A.E.F.,
And pardon me, please, if I give vent
To something akin to sentiment.
But we have our moments Over Here
When we want to cry and we want to cheer;
And the hurrah feeling will not down
When you meet a man from your own home town.
It’s many a lonesome, longsome day
Since you embarked from the U.S.A.,
And you met some men—it’s a great big war—
From towns that you never had known before;
And you landed here, and your rest camp mate
Was a man from some strange and distant state.
Liked him? Yes; but you wanted to see
A man from the town where you used to be.
And then you went, by design or chance,
All over the well-known map of France;
And you yearned with a yearn that grew and grew
To talk with a man from the burg you knew.
And some lugubrious morn when
Your morale is batting about .110,
“Where are you from?” and you make reply,
And the O.D. warrior says, “So am I.”
The universe wears a smiling face
As you spill your talk of the old home place;
You talk of the streets, and the home town jokes,
And you find that you know each other’s folks;
And you haven’t any more woes at all
Ad you both decide that the world is small—
A statement adding to its renown
When you meet a man from your own home town.
You may be among the enlisted men,
You may be a Lieut. or a Major-Gen.;
Your home may be up in the Chilkoot Pass,
In Denver, Col., or in Pittsfield, Mass.;
You may have come from Chicago, Ill.,
Buffalo, Portland, or Louisville—
But there’s nothing, I’m gambling, can keep you down,
When you meet a man from your own home town.
* * * * *
If you want to know why I wrote this pome,
Well . . . I’ve just had a talk with a guy from home.
