Lest we forget...

(Cross-posted at Booman Tribune, and FPed at European Tribune.)


~

I am really rather afraid,
but more afraid to stay at home with my conscience.*

~

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch, be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields

~Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae*

~

Poppy field, taken by flickrist phitar

~

God and the soldier
All men adore
In time of trouble,
And no more;
For when war is over
And all things righted,
God is neglected--
The old soldier slighted.

~Anonymous

~

War Memorial, taken 9.24.2005

~

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds—and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

~John Gillespie Magee, Jr. (1922-1941)

~

Sunset, taken by flickrist creativity+

I will not forget.


__________
* (Alternate link d/t Veterans Affairs Canada webpage problems.)

See flickrist appaloosa's 2005 Year of the Veteran photoset.