A poem for Remembrance

Remember the Western Desert, El Alamein, the Normandy beaches.

Remember Coventry, Dresden, Hiroshima and the Burma Road.

Remember Korea, the Falkland Islands, Northern Ireland, the Balkans, East Timor, Afghanistan and the Gulf.

Remember the courage, the comradeship, the ingenuity, the spirit of working together for a common cause, the planning together for a better world that would come with peace.

Remember the call to arms, the patriotic songs, the posters, the partings which were such sweet sorrow. The sound of the drum, the skirl of the pipe, the prayer that God would be on our side.

Remember the carnage; the colossal stinking bloody horror of war. The ripped bodies on the wire, the platoons of which only 3 out of 40 lived.

Remember the hopes of a whole generation left to evaporate in the sands of a desert, the cold of the mountains or sink forever in the oceans of the world.

Remember the wealth of nations being fired from guns, dropped as bombs, smashing schools, homes, factories, churches and hospitals, destroying crops and ruining trees.

Remember the widows of sixty years and more, the old men and women who never knew their fathers.

Remember the lives and love that was lost, the limbs distorted, the wisdom wasted, the minds that are still pained by memories.

Remember the families bereft by recent wars and conflict.

Remember this day the children who will die while nation fights nation.

Remember the ones who asked us to remember them.

Father, remember us; and forgive us our sins against you and our fellow man. Amen

(Author Unknown)