We Shall Not Sleep...

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'If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders Fields'

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This was the only poem my Dad could recite and he recited it often and always with a proud Navy grin.

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This was the first poem I read and I memorized it with a reverence beyond my six or seven years of life.

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This is the poem I think of when I think of war and soldiers and combat and patriotism.

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This is the poem I turn to when I cannot reconcile why war never goes out of style, why we take arms against one another when we could just as well roll the dice or mediate our nations into some wriggly compromise.

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This is the poem I remember when it is important that I understand the protection and pride of military families who feel abandoned and disrespected when voices rise and a war is opposed.

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This is what I think of today, Memorial Day, when I think of my Dad and his stories about WWII, the ones that always without fail made him cry;

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When I think of my brother in Viet Nam;

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When I think of my precious job working in an Army Education Center;

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When I think of Deborah's PFC now Specialist Ryan;

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When I think of the horrors and highs of combat;

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When I think of No. More. War.

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Love,

kj