Memorial Day Poem

By Dan Samaria
Publisher/YC
May 24, 2009

 

While looking for stories to honor those who have gave their lives on Memorial Day. I came across this poem. That I think shows the true meaning of this special day. It was written by Cadet Major Kelly Strong Air Force Junior ROTC Homestead Senior High School Homestead, Florida 1988.

I hope you will enjoy it. We would like to hear from you on how this poem affected you if it did. You could reach me at dan@youngchronicle.com

 

A wonderful Poem…For Memorial Day and every day…

I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze.
A young marine saluted it,
and then he stood at ease.

I looked at him in uniform
so young, so tall, so proud,
With hair cut square and eyes alert.
He’d stand out in any crowd.

I thought how many men like him
Had fallen through the years.
How many died on foreign soil?
How many mothers’ tears?

How many pilots’ planes shot down?
How many died at sea?
How many foxholes were soldiers’ graves?
No, freedom is not free.

I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still.
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.

I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant “Amen,”
When a flag had draped a coffin
Of a brother or a friend.

I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.

I thought about a graveyard
At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No, freedom is not free.

Source: Navy For Moms