There's black boots or there's brown shoes
Depends on rank not what you choose.
Call them 'sir' if they wear brown shoes
Address by rank for N.C.O.s
A soldier's rank dictates his life
It's much the same for a soldier's wife.
Soldiers and servants know their place
Take their orders, show good grace.
Mum can talk posh or just like us
Switch on or off, not make a fuss.
I had to learn to do it too
A voice for home and one for school.
Mum's got a job at the officers' mess
Makes the money worries less.
She's working in the kitchen there
Sometimes there's left over fare.
She brings us home warmed over chips.
We learn to like the taste of this.
My sisters says when she talks to me
Her voice will be quite 'officery'.
She tells them things she won't tell me
She thinks that I'm too prim maybe?
She told me that her father died.
I learned the truth and could have cried
It wasn't what I heard you see
But she only told them; she didn't tell me.
"Don't tell Andrew, he'll be upset."
That hit me hard; it's tough to forget.
But forget it and move on we must.
What will be next for mum and us?