Ernie Pyle
If you are able, save them a place
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.
Maj. Micheal Davis O’Donnell
Republic of Vietnam 1970
And afterward, he turns the rifle in at the armory, and he believes he is finished with the rifle.
But no matter what else he might do with his hands,
Love a woman,
Build a house,
Change his son's diaper,
His Hands remember the rifle.
Unknown
Three-quarters of a soldier's life is spent in aimlessly waiting about.
Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy
Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy
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