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Karagin
Imperial Karagin Army
Imperial General
Joined: 04-Feb-2002 00:00
Posts: 4120
Location: United States
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 Posted: 11-Nov-2007 01:09 Post subject: Veteran's Day. A day to remember and reflect |
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For many of us, November 11th is just another day. One that may mean we get a day off from work or a parade happens, folks cheer as the soldiers, sailors and marines march by and the guys from the Legion and VFW wave from their cars as the parade goes through the downtown of many small American towns.
For others the day is sober reflection on those who have gone before them, and those they know. Friends and buddies all who have made the ultimate scarifice, will not see another parade or get the day to sit and enjoy afternoon with friends and family.
On November 11th, the fighting stopped on the Western Front, World War One had come to an end. At 11AM November 11th, both sides stop. This war has seen the use of every know technology used to kill. Yet in the end, nothing was gained. 35 countries fought in WW1, the war went from 1914 to 1918, official.
The US only fought for 2 of those years, 1917 to 1918. Ironically, in 1938 Congress voted to make November 11th, at the time called Armistice Day, a national holiday, the next year World War 2 broke.
Every year on November 11th we give thanks for peace, observe a moment of silence at 11 A.M., and remember those who fought and died during times of war.
So here are few words describing things:
In Flanders Fields
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.
Just A Common Soldier
He was getting old and paunchy, and his hair was falling fast.
And he sat around the Legion telling stories of the past.
Of a war that he fought in, and the deeds that he had done
In his exploits with his buddies, they were heroes, everyone.
And though sometimes to his neighbors, his tales became a joke,
All his Legion buddies listened, for they knew whereof he spoke.
But we'll hear his tales no longer, for old Bill has passed away
And the world's a little poorer, for a soldier died today.
He will not be mourned by many, just his children and his wife,
For he lived an ordinary, quiet and uneventful life,
Held a job and raised a family, quietly going his own way;
And the world won't note his passing, though a soldier died today.
When politicians leave this earth, their bodies lie in state,
While thousands note their passing and proclaim that they were great,
Papers tell their life stories from the time they were young
But the passing of a soldier goes unnoticed and unsung.
Is the greatest contribution to the welfare of our land
A guy who breaks his promises and cons his fellow man?
Or the ordinary fellow, who in times of war and strife
Goes off to serve his country and offers up his life?
A politician's stipend and the style in which he lives
Are sometimes disproportionate to the service that he gives,
While the ordinary soldier, who offered up his all
Is paid off with a medal, and perhaps a pension small.
It's so easy to forget them, for it was so long ago
That the old Bills of our country went to battle, but we know
It was not the politicians, with their compromise and ploys,
Who won for us the freedom that our country now enjoys.
Should you find yourself in danger with your enemies at hand.
Would you want a politician with his ever-shifting stand?
Or would you prefer a simple soldier, who has sworn to defend
His home, his kin and country, and would fight until the end?
He was just a common soldier, and his ranks are growing thin
But his presence should remind us we may need his like again.
For when countries are in conflict, then we find the soldier's part
Is to clean up the troubles that the politicians start.
If we cannot do him honor while he's here to hear the praise
Then at least let's give him homage at the ending of his days.
Perhaps just a simple headline in a paper that would say:
Our Country is in Mourning. For a Soldier Died Today.
--Anon
"God and the soldier we adore,
In time of danger, not before.
The danger past and all things righted,
God is forgot and the soldier slighted."
--Anon
WHAT IS A VET?
Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing
limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye. Others may
carry the evidence inside them: a pin holding a bone together, a
piece of shrapnel in the leg - or perhaps another sort of inner
steel:
The soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity. Except in
parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe
wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking.
What is a vet?
He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia
sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel
carriers didn't run out of fuel.
He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks,
whose overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times
in the cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery spent in hell, near the
38th parallel.
She - or he - is the nurse who fought against futility and went
to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang.
He is the POW who went away one person and came back another -
or didn't come back AT ALL.
He is the Quantico drill instructor who, has never seen combat -
but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account
rednecks and gang members into Marines, and teaching them to
watch each other's backs.
He is the parade riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons
and medals with a prosthetic hand.
He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and
medals pass him by.
He is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns,
whose Presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever
preserve the memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor
dies unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's
sunless deep.
He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket - palsied
now and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi death
camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive
to hold him when the nightmares come.
He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being - a
person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the
service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so
others would not have to sacrifice theirs.
He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness,
and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on
behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known.
So remember, each time you see someone who has served our
country, just lean over and say Thank You. That's all most
people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any
medals they could have been awarded or were awarded.
Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU."
Remember November 11th is Veterans Day
Veterans Day
It is the soldier, not the reporter,
Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the soldier, not the poet,
Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the soldier, not the campus organizer,
Who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.
It is the soldier who salutes the flag, who serves the flag,
And whose coffin does the flag, which allows the protester to burn the flag, drape.
Father Denis Edward O'Brien
Chaplain USMC
_________________
Karagin
Only the dead have seen the end of war. - Plato
"Wasted trip Man. Nobody said nuthin' about lockin' horns with no tigers." Oddball
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