Lyrics

Shells
By Terry Penney
©2011

He remembers his innocent days
He’d walk the beaches of Trinity Bay
Kicking driftwood and counting the waves
Roll in over sand, sea stone, kelp
And Shells

Ten years later on the fields of France
But by the grace of God did he stand a chance
Trying his best to survive, hunkered down in a trench
As they flew overhead and with them bringing Hell
Shells, shells

What he wouldn’t give to go back to a time
When he’d walk to that old General Store with a dime
Have candy and Coke down by the old Maple tree
Back to the days when his hands were clean
And Hell was a place that he’d never seen
He lies in the mud crying and cursing himself
And the shells

On some ship coming home from the war
Wondering to himself what all the suffering was for
A vacant stare, he’d be the same nevermore
A ghost of himself
A shell, a shell

What he wouldn’t give to go back to a time
When he’d walk to that old General Store with a dime
Have candy and Coke down by the old Maple tree
Back to the days when his hands were clean
And Hell was a place that he’d never been
Lying in the mud crying and cursing himself
And the shells, the shells, the shells