I'm young and I'm strong
I've got this God forsaken world by the balls!
I've got a one-way ticket to freedom
Ain't got no one now gonna take it from me

I was a soldier, age twenty-one
In a war I'm not sure what I was fighting for
And yet I turned from a boy to a man there
Goodbye to innocence and a sweet sixteen

My whole life I could not arrange
My wicked ways I could never change
Don't try, don't try now to understand
For this is the ballad of a lonely man

Close to me is a photograph
Of a family left far, far behind
At once I had love it slipped away from
I searched a lifetime but could not find

In a hospital bed, I'm violently ill
Just one more drink nurse I swear to God!
I've got my St. Anthony and my whiskey
Yes I'm a veteran of three foreign wars!

My whole life I could not arrange
My wicked ways I could never change
Don't try, don't try now to understand
For this is the ballad of a lonely man