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A soldier called his mother from San Francisco Bay,

Said, “Mother, I’ll be coming home, but hear me what I say.

I want to bring a buddy, please, Mom, if you don’t mind.

He has one leg, one arm, one eye,

And he needs your love so kind.”

The Mother told her soldier with a harsh and bitter tone,

No, don’t bring your buddy here; find him another home.

We just don’t have a place for him, and if it’s how you say,

We sure don’t need a handicap to be here in the way.

Then later came a telegram; the soldier boy was dead.

He took his life; they found a note, and this is what it said,

“No, don’t bring your buddy here,” his mother’s words were they,

“We sure don’t need a handicap to be here in the way.”

At last the wheels stopped turning, as the mother met the train.

She came to get her only son with tears that fell like rain.

She stared into the cold steel box to kiss her boy goodbye,

And there he was, a handicap – one leg, one arm, one eye.

The Art of Illustrating, Jack Exum, page 105, 106