A group of old diggers shambling along

Wearing bits of uniform and maybe a song.

Out of step, out of time, the wrong generation

Glorifying wars of an old-fashioned nation?

When you listen to the band, what do you hear?

Praise to the Lord who is now out of style,

from a generation of men who gather awhile.

Their out-of-tune singing all feeble and wierd

In praise of an empire long-since disappeared.

When you hear the Last Post, of what do you think?

Hurry up! Hurry up! What are we waiting for?

Have to get home as we don’t want anymore

A wasting of time, there is so much to do,

Work to be done before the day is through.

Or, when you watch the parade, is this what you see:

The proud old men who strive to walk tall,

In memory of comrades who gave of them all.

Who stand in all weathers, hail, sleet or snow,

In respect of old Diggers who we’ll never know?

When you listen to the band, is this what you hear

Old soldiers every thankful for surviving the war

Remembering their friends whom they will see no more?

With a tremor in their voice and a tear in their eye

Reliving their memories as each year goes by?

When you hear the Last Post is this what you think

Of the men who have fallen so the rest of us may 

Live lives of freedom without fear day by day

When you leave the parade do you go home and say

For our tomorrow they gave their today?

Robin Macpherson, Kianga