Salute
Bunker Hill, Yorktown, Lundy’s Lane,
Monterey, Bull Run, Gettysburg, Shiloh,
Antietam, St. Mihiel, Belleau Woods,
D-Day, Saipan, Iwo Jima, The Bulge,
Chosin Reservoir, Pork Chop Hill,
Ia Drang, Khe Sanh, Hamburger Hill,
Iraq and Afghanistan.
Famous battles in American history.
Washington, Scott, Grant, Lee, Custer,
Pershing, Patton, Eisenhower, Nimitz,
MacArthur, Westmoreland, Abrams.
Famous leaders in American history.
We are all familiar with these names and places.
But what about the nameless men and women?
The faceless citizens who gave up families, jobs,
education, comfort.
The ones who gave America their blood, bodies,
minds to defend us and set others free.
Their blood has stained countless lands.
Their wounds, physical and mental,
should remind us that freedom is not cheap.
The noncoms, privates, petty officers, junior officers.
The occupants of The Tomb of the Unknown,
the Punch Bowl, the French cemeteries, Arlington,
and countless unknown graves.
The living dead who suffer from grievous wounds
and PTSD.
These are the true heroes.
Categories:
saipan, hero,
Form: Free verse
I was bored and strapped for cash,
Badly needing a vacation.
So I took a voyage of the mind,
With my vivid imagination.
Across the open seas I sailed,
To some far and distant lands.
While perched atop a camel's back,
In caravans on desert sands.
I climbed the Himalayas,
Behind a Sherpa as my guide.
To see Nepal and then Tibet,
The Dalai Lama by my side.
Crossed the Great Wall of China,
In a mammoth hot air balloon.
Floating high in a starlit sky,
Tipped my hat to the Crescent Moon.
Back to Earth, I made my way,
Skimming the Sea of Japan.
To the Port of Tokyo,
In a rickety Saipan.
Growing weary from my travels,
My mind no longer fit to roam.
Next time I'll visit other sites,
For now it's time to journey home.
Categories:
saipan, journey, mountains, sea,
Form: Rhyme
One day, I saw a very unusual thing
in a business newspaper I was perusing.
It was a brief story present on the front page.
A taxpayer considered this thing an outrage.
He was a very honest and straightforward man,
an American from the island of Saipan.
This is a territory in the Pacific;
the Marianas Islands to be specific.
He filed his Federal Income Tax return.
He did not omit anything that he would earn.
The territory was reported as “M. I.”
Some IRS agents soon caught this with their eye.
It appeared that somebody goofed up again.
He got a state income tax form from Michigan.
Categories:
saipan, funny
Form: Rhyme