Memorial Day verses

[ka5s]

Tomorrow

How calm you looked;
The truck bed
On which you lay,
A place
From which you
Smiled at the heaven
You had found.

Tomorrow I must remember
How you looked,
As if with your last breath
You could prove
There was not much to fear from dying,
Life not hard to leave behind.

They picked you up:
Limbs stretched to twice
What limbs should do,
Head squashed and flattened
By the stress, they pulled;
What fluids yet moved within that flaccid skin
Rolled off the truck
Before the body bag could catch
What you'd become.

Tomorrow I remember
What your wife would never see,
Closed casket, a kindness,
To keep her free from dreams
I would forget,
If such I could.
Tomorrow,
I must remember.

revised for Memorial Day, 2005

© Cortland Richmond

[ka5s]

Late Memorial


Lord, pardon my neglect.;
I do not willfully forget
All those who fought to keep me free,
Who live now just in memory,
Photos on a yellowed page,
Forever young, though others age.
Let they who served that I might sleep,
For whom their loved ones yet will weep,
In glory with brave comrades stand,
A silent Guard around our land.


Cortland E. Richmond, 1994

[ka5s]

Remembers


Remembers the ancient,
Whistles and gas,
Mud and cold;
The German trench line.

Remembers, the old man,
Blood, bugles,
The charges 'cross
His haunted nights.

Remembers, the middle-aged,
Struggling to stay young,
The smell and noise
Some small war taught.

Remembers the soldier
On a dusty road,
That wars are ever fought,
And old men’s dreams forgot.

© Cortland Richmond 2005

[WA4ABM]

Cortland,
Excellent! Thanks for sharing on this Memorial Day. Keep it up. http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif 73, Rich