And save one backward glance when you are leaving
For the places they can no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say you loved them,
Though you may, or may not have always.
Take what they have left, or what they have taught you
With their dying, and keep it as your own.
And in that time when men decide, or feel safe,
To call the war insane, take one moment
To embrace those gentle heroes you left behind.
- Maj. Michael Davis O'Donnell
KIA, Cambodia, March 1970
We'll remind those who need it that this day is not to wish any veteran a "thank you" for their service.
Unless you're doing it while laying a wreath at their gravesite.
But it's okay to enjoy a ball game, a picnic, a long holiday. They'd not begrudge you that. Just take a moment to recall that they bought it for you, and gave up all their tomorrows, to pay for your today.
And take a moment, if only in your heart, "to embrace those gentle heroes left behind".
10 comments:
I hope you don't mind that I copied this, in full and with a h/t to your blog, to my fecesbook page. If you wish I'll take it down.
Solemn day. I always think of my Uncle buried in Italy.
And let us not forget, that not all casualties, especially in the Cold War, were from combat.
1LT Al Torn, USAF, died on 17 October 1984 when his F-111 crashed during a night terrain following mission.
He was in my flight at AFROTC field training. Still remember sitting at my desk in shock looking at the article in the Air Force Times listing his name, as he was the first of my classmates lost.
RIP.
Was in Cambodia, in 1970, as a foot soldier. Never knew there was any poetry came out of it. Just got a slight gunshot wound, dengue fever, and very tired, sweaty, dirty, and not really understanding it all at age 19. Don't understand it all now, either, except for the part that men seem to think they can fight and kill each other to own a few more marbles than the next guy. Remember the fellas left behind, who fell and never got up again. Including my brigade commander. Pretty good guy too. Years later, touched his name on the Wall. Kind of a strange feeling (actually met him when I was a private) to be there and do that. I don't remember a lot of days between now and then, when I didn't wake up thinking how stupid it all was.
Well done, how you ripped off the closing credits of Hamburger Hill, attempting to appear as if it's historical knowledge you pulled from the bowels of your brain & (military) education.
I miss my father more with each passing day. I was lucky to have a true hero for a father. Army Ranger, POW, 2x Purple Hearts for service in Korea. He's why I joined the Army. We stand upon the shoulders of the giants who came before us. My father being of those giants.
I picked my soldier and did so. No other flowers there, but I was able to find information about him online, and share it with others verbally. He may be gone, but we remember him.
Richie Martin the Great White Hope ! Rest in peace my brother . No ethnic plot here . Just a red headed white boy that came to our school in 63 . The school was black at 80% . We were dominated by the majority blacks not only in numbers but have you ever noticed the speed and grace of a black runner ? Them fellas can run ! Me and Ritchie bonded quickly . Both of us were ruddy Irish boys with an eye for the girls and a "don't fook with me " attitude . The first practice Ritchie took off and never once looked back to see if anyone was close . Nobody ever was . Dash , run , hurdles , it didn't matter . That little Irish boy was like lightning . He quit school in 67 one year before graduation to go fight in Nam . He came back in a box 3 months later . I placed my hand on his name on our hometown Nam Wall and fought that overwhelming feeling of emptiness he left . My friend . My brother .
@Anon6:39P,
Nice try.
The poem was written in 1970, by an Army pilot who died in Cambodia during that war a couple of months later. Hamburger Hill, a movie made in 1987, which very few people ever saw (it ranked 76 that year out of 200, behind mega-flop of all time Ishtar at #74), and almost no-one born in the last 30 years even knows about, about a mostly-forgotten battle in 1969 for anyone born after that date, and the movie ripped off the poem's author.
I knew about the poem long before the film was made, having read it in 1985 during my time in the military, in the book Dear America: Letters Home From Vietnam, and have posted it on this blog in prior years as well.
Get over yourself, brave anonymous online lackwit. Grow balls big enough to own your jackassery by name, or STFU. Your remarks are preserved here purely for the entertainment value of mocking such stupidity. Stop shooting yourself in the dick; you haven't got enough of one to spare any.
Off topic, but your Austrian army friend has a new update, and there’s an English version this time.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RpC1kXhW2Lw
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