Lest we forget.

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Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Thanks to all who have served and are currently serving.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Posted: Sun Nov 07, 2010 11:05 pm

Thank you for all who serve and have served.

Our family is full of veterans who have served who know that Freedom is Not Free.

Posted: Sun Nov 07, 2010 11:10 pm

Posted: Sun Nov 07, 2010 11:17 pm

Thank you to all past, present, and future men and women serving their countries to keep us free. We are forever indebted.

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 12:15 am

Thank you all vets. And thank you Frank Buckles.

http://frankbuckles.org/

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 1:49 am

Thank you to all that have served and are serving to keep us safe. And to the families that support them.

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 3:41 am

We had two children once. They are both in the military and children no more. The oldest has been preparing for war for the last four years and spent a few hours with us today. I am still a little shaken as it just sunk in how close we came to losing him when he told us how the vehicle he was in was totaled. The other has been training, conditioning and studying for war the last two years. We will have them both home next for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The oldest will bring home 3 or 4 servicemen for Thanksgiving and we may have up to 6 over for Christmas.

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 7:14 am

For The Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

Laurence Binyon, 1914

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 10:39 am

"Their name liveth for evermore" Honouring and commemorating a debt that can never be repaid.

Letter written by a soldier the night before he was killed in WWI :-

"Farewell. You have known all the others who have been so dear to me and you will say goodbye to them for me. And so, in imagination, I extinguish the lamp of my existence on the eve of this terrible battle. I cut myself out of the circle of which I have formed a beloved part. The gap which I leave must be closed; the human chain must be unbroken. I, who once formed a small link in it, bless it for all eternity. And till your last days, remember me, I beg you, with tender love. Honour my memory without guilding it, and cherish me in your loving faithful hearts"

- Taken from The Unknown Soldier, by Neil Hanson a non-fiction book that I'm currently reading, recommended to me by a friend.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 06 Feb 2008 Posts: 720

“Have you news of my boy Jack?”
Not this tide.
“When d’you think that he’ll come back?”
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.

“Has any one else had word of him?”
Not this tide.
For what is sunk will hardly swim,
Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.

“Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?”
None this tide,
Nor any tide,
Except he did not shame his kind —
Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide.

Then hold your head up all the more,
This tide,
And every tide;
Because he was the son you bore,
And gave to that wind blowing and that tide!
”

Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2010 9:44 pm

All gave some,
Some gave all.

Thank you.

Posted: Tue Nov 09, 2010 8:27 am

From a monument to British war dead on the island of Vis in the Adriatic:

Quote:

Here dead we lie
Because we did not choose
To live and shame the land
From which we sprung

Life to be sure
Is nothing much to lose,
But young men think it is
And we were young

And they shall be mine
Said the LORD of hosts
In that day when I make up my jewels

Posted: Tue Nov 09, 2010 9:28 pm

We shall not forget

Posted: Wed Nov 10, 2010 10:25 am

For the Fallen

Now singing days are over; scattered, song
And singer lie
Silent, as silent as the crosses are
At Falamai.

Pohutukawa sprinkles blood to some
North Auckland beach,
Too distant now for these our homeless dead
Ever to reach.

No little thing is life, and brave the breath
That parts the lips.
Can more be given to the scales before
The balance tips?

Weigh this; the greater loss and death of all,
Should Queen Street see
The Bloody Sun displayed, and horror fall
On Lambton Quay.

Our stream of battle joins the sea of war.
Each silent lad
Is kin to those who held El Alamein
And Stalingrad.

The stranger palms shall shed no tenderness,
Nor softer sky
Be theirs; the more must we stand guard for those
At Falamai.

—Gordon Watson.

Thanks Yastreb

Master Baiter Joined: 06 Jan 2010 Posts: 154

"My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."

Wilfred Owen - Dulce et Decorum Est

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

For all the fallen and the families left behind
In particular my uncle died 14/2/45 and my daughters friend killed by IED in Afghanistan this year

Posted: Thu Nov 11, 2010 2:16 pm

'The Corn Field', Kent, England - Autumn, 1942.

The corn waved this way and that, like a golden flag
In pleasant surrender
The plough had already gone down the hill
We laid together, looking skywards
They might think they can fly, immortal, but thwarted now
Their metal mixes with dirt. Not pretty.
Anger assuaged. Water rising.

She sighed. "I loved him once."
Then once more the metal moved over the air.
We laughed in vain, at the inane.
Of a love now lost.

The yellow corn swayed this way and that. Harvest time.
We kissed again. I remember it now.
Knowing that the world would never be the same again.

Master Baiter Joined: 06 Jan 2010 Posts: 154

Nanny Ogg wrote:

For all the fallen and the families left behind
In particular my uncle died 14/2/45 and my daughters friend killed by IED in Afghanistan this year

You would not believe how many of these things are planted every day.

We were diffusing around 5 a day on my last tour. They're made using pretty basic components (we found one made of washing machine parts), but they're utterly deadly.

Sorry to hear you've lost a friend due to these devices.

Posted: Thu Nov 11, 2010 3:15 pm

We have many veterans in our family as I mentioned before.

However, today I am thinking about my cousin who was killed in WW2 in the Philippine Islands by the enemies bayonet. I still vividly remember his military funeral when the guard fired those volleys and as I write this I still get tears welled up in my eyes.

Thank you to all who have served our wonderful country and also to those who have been our allies when we needed them. We remember you too.