(Mary Chapin Carpenter)



Late one night when the wind was still

Daddy brought the baby to the window sill

To see a bit of heaven shoot across the sky

The one and only time Daddy saw it fly



It came from the east just as bright as a torch

The neighbors had a party on their porch

Daddy rocked the baby, Mother said "amen"

When Halley came to visit in nineteen ten



Now back then Jackson was a real small town

And it's not every night a comet comes around

It was almost eighty years since its last time through

So I bet your mother would've said "amen" too



As its tail stretched out like a stardust streak

The papers wrote about it every day for a week

They wondered where it's going and where it's been

When Halley came to Jackson in 1910



Now Daddy told the baby sleeping in his arms

To dream a little dream of a comet's charms

And he made a little wish as she slept so sound

In nineteen eighty-six that wish came 'round



It came from the east, just as bright as a torch

She saw it in the sky from her daddy's porch

As heavenly sent as it was back then

When Halley came to Jackson in nineteen ten

Late one night when the wind was still