and the icy winds did blow
Water seeped into his shoes
and the drizzle turned to snow
His eyes were red, his hopes were dead,
and the wine was running low
And the old man came home
His tears fell on the sidewalk
as he stumbled in the street
A dozen faces stopped to stare,
but no one stopped to speak
For his castle was a hallway,
and the bottle his only friend
And the old man stumbled in
Up a dark and dingy staircase
His ragged coat around him
And he wondered how it happened
that it all turned out this way
Getting lost like a fool in the forest
And as he lay there sleeping
in the face of one so dear
Who loved him in the springtime
When the wildflowers did bloom
Oh, she touched his grizzled fingers
and she called him by his name
Then he heard the joyful sound
of children at their games
In an old house on a hillside
Where the river runs down
Where the mighty roar them
big jets soar above the canyon streets
The conmen con but life goes on
For an old forgotten soldier
the dawn will come no more
For the old man has come home
