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I was a mere lad of fourteen way back in June of nineteen forty-four.
I recall so well the Sixth of June when brave men stormed Normandy's Shore!
They were called 'news bulletins' in those days that flashed news on the air!
The course of battle was looking bleak and it was surely a day of prayer!

I was weeding rows of vegetables in the truck garden on my father's farm,
And, even as a young Hoosier boy I was filled with growing fear and alarm,
As I pictured gallant men spilling their blood on Omaha's crimson sand,
And struggling through the surf for the precarious safety of no man's land!

It was an agonizing day for the families of those involved in that awful strife,
Knowing a dreaded telegram could arrive anytime reporting the loss of life.
I proffered a prayer for those soldiers and my brother in the South Pacific,
Knowing tougher times were bound to come in this conflict so horrific!

With each stroke of my hoe upon that Hoosier soil I could only ponder,
Why courageous young Americans had to die on alien shores o'er yonder.
But later as I learned more about life, to me it became so very clear,
That they died for our precious freedoms that we ever hold so dear!

Upon the plain above Omaha Beach lie nine thousand men we mourn,
Who await Gabriel's clarion bugle call on that triumphant morn!
Lonely marble markers are etched with the names of heroes known,
But, alas, too many others read, "Known But To God Alone."

Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
© All Rights Reserved

Placed No. 2 in Joann Grisetti's "Memories Of June" Contest - June 2012

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