For Hadar

What does it mean to protect and defend?

A pretty young girl with a gun in her hand

Holds the burden of keeping us safe in the night

And the boys in the playground will soon learn how to fight

Childhood is over when your back’s to the wall

It’s no secret that here childhood’s short for us all

That  today’s skinny shoulders will carry the weight

Of a people’s existence, a whole country’s fate

And the callouses covering those once dimpled hands

Are the tools he requires to protect our land

And that little boy jumping in puddles of rain

Now waits for his turn to jump out of a plane

And our children, they ask just to live for today

To be young for a moment to dance and to play

We will blink and it’s over, a day we will miss

When tears disappeared with a hug and a kiss

Tomorrow is coming when they’ll (We’ll) have to be brave

It’s their people, that childhood, they are destined to save

These young brothers and sisters who are bound in their blood

So quickly united, so quickly in love

They know  heartache will come, they know there will be sorrow

But because of them there will be childhood tomorrow