Coming Home

words and music by Steven Clark (DOB 1957)

Put a light in the window,
Your brother’s coming home
Set a meal on the table,
Your brother’s coming home
He’ll be tired and weary
After all these years alone
He’s coming home,
Your brother’s coming home

Take the chain from the door
Your sister’s coming home
Open wide your arms
Your sister’s coming home
Don’t leave her standing there
After all the pain she’s known
She’s coming home,
Your sister’s coming home

Coming home to a place they’ve never been
Coming home to a land they’ve never seen
Coming home to a family they have never known
All Jock Tamson's bairns
Are coming home

He's been angry and afraid
Your father's coming home
He's been hounded and betrayed
Your father's coming home
And with every act of kindness
A seed of hope is sown
He's coming home.
Your father's coming home

Bring her in from the cold
Your mother's coming home
Sit her down by the fire
Your mother's coming home
Make her warm, make her welcome
Before the chance is gone
She's coming home, your mother's coming home

Chorus

From Iraq and Zimbabwe,
Your family's coming home
And from Turkey and Somalia
Your family's coming home
Seeking rest and refuge
They have never known
They're coming home,
Your family's coming home

Chorus

Words:

Jock Tamson’s Bairns: the human race, common humanity

This song was brought to Sangschule by Anne and Scott Murray of Sangsters and more recently by Gordeanna McCulloch.

Steven Clark is a singer/songwriter from Springburn, Glasgow and this is probably his most famous song so far, dealing with contemporary issues of exile and immigration.

Singer Ian Bruce includes “Coming Home” on his album Demon’s Dance, and Steven’s website (www.stevenclarksongs.me.uk) links to a review of this in magazine Living Tradition no.63. Reviewer Hector Christie singles out “Coming Home” for mention and rates this ‘stunner of a song’ as ‘way up there with the humanitarianism of a Hamish Henderson.’

The title on Ian Bruce’s album becomes “Comin Hame” and some other words are changed accordingly, but Steven didn’t write the song in Scots and Sangschule kept to his version.