There’s a drawer in the kitchen
That rarely gets cleaned
It’s full of cat toys and rice
And an old can of beans

It’s also where a memory lives
A box of Christmas cheer
The kind of crackers you pull at both ends
Which fail to fire every year

They’ve been in that drawer for years
Ever since my father-in-law died
He brought them whenever he came over
To cook the turkey, his pride

He wore the silly paper hats
So we all wore them too
He blew the whistles, traded the toys
And that was fine, because we knew

He’d flown 25 missions in Bomber Command
Over Germany in the war
He risked his life with every flight
And still came back for more

He had come home from the war
Just happy to be alive
He didn’t care much for protocol
Or suffer the anxiety jive

He just enjoyed life, and Christmas
And crackers, and silly hats
And we enjoyed them as much as he did
Because he was Dad, and that’s that