Honoring Sacrifice
Honoring Sacrifice
By: Tom Wright
4/24/04
For country, they chose to honor a call,
now, the piercing sound of a rifle’s report.
An echoing trumpet, sadly says it all.
let us hero our young as a last resort.
No image portrays our freedom’s cost,
like that of a flag draped casket.
A mental souvenir of war, un-tossed,
on display from memory’s basket.
It serves to remind of a hero’s place,
should we treat it as a mere statistic.
For each had a home, name, and face,
harboring dreams that were realistic.
They abnegated those dreams for a chore,
accepting that vitality might be tried.
Death isn’t made a contrivance of war,
but a mental souvenir from those who died.
A twenty-one-gun salute seems to say it all.
I sit and watch the evening news and am inundated with war news,
body counts and flag draped gurneys. I always try to look beyond mere numbers
and realize that these were real people with real hopes, dreams, and families.
People who had volunteered, for one reason or another, not allowing thoughts to creep in that their return home might be via body bag.
“Honoring Sacrifice” was written in remembrance of those
who have had their lives cut short for a cause?
Copyright © Tom Wright | Year Posted 2019
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