The Unknown Soldier (feat. Sir Billy Connolly, Sir Anthony Hopkins & Liam Neeson)

More than fifty thousand names Are carved on Ypres' Menin gate Of soldiers who have no known graves Just their destiny and date Witness and last testament Name and rank and regiment Is now all that survives From so many squandered lives And for every name inscribed The poor bereaved were left to mourn The passing of all those who died With no white cross on tended lawn No place to go to contemplate The sacrifice this wicked waste No footprint left to show where once they trod Allegedly known unto god From Ypres Arras Aisne and Somme Six unknown soldiers were exhumed A blindfold general picked one man And reverently they brought him home Six black horses drew the hearse Through silent London crowds immersed In deepest thought belief or wishful prayer That it might be their own boy there The metal tyres on the carriage wheels Played the tuneless requiem The sky as grey as bayonet steel Above the sombre hatless men One more enemy to kill That remaining sense of guilt That through it all somehow they had survived Returned to mothers sweethearts wives Familiar streets their own backyards Their medals and all praise ignored Relieved to be his honour guard And walk with him their true reward While far from pomp and circumstance Across the autumn fields of France The trenches start to slowly fill and fade The bloody page turned by the ploughman's blade Thankfully we'll never know If he was constant strong or frail Scared or brave in equal parts Country tanned or city pale A carefree youth or thoughtful lad Not wholly good or wholly bad A bomb does not judge how you played your part A bullet stops a lions heart With softest cloth and gentlest broom To sweep and wipe cathedral dust Like dried tears from this marble tomb Take care for he was one of us In perfect irony and grief The bride's bouquet becomes a wreath And wrapped beneath dark angels folded wings Tommy Atkins rests with kings