Veteran's Day

Thank you to all the Veterans out there, especially my Dad and Uncle Jim, for serving – today, yesterday, and tomorrow - to protect our Country. Today is YOUR day and a day we appreciate you immensely!

xoxo

Verse Salute
by Paul Berchtold, September, 2010

O mixed up world, that needs a bunch of wars,
To keep people free, and also our shores,
But without the war there is no peace,
Justice can't flourish, nor wealth increase.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

O brave ones willing, to protect and serve,
Our freedoms defend, our values preserve,
Willing to go, and pay the price,
Willing to make, every sacrifice.

O brave ones leaving, your family and friends,
Ready to travel, to the world's ends,
Base to base, and port to port,
Upholding our country, with your support.

O brave ones learning, how to fight,
Properly use, all your might,
To stop evil marching, all over the place,
Shaking it's fist, right in your face.

O brave ones united, in lawful pride,
Fighting as a team, side by side,
Then the shocking, horrible time,
Your closest friends, cut down in their prime.

O brave ones crying, seeing black and blue,
O brave ones hurting, through and through,
O brave ones crying, many tears shed,
O brave ones shocked, dying, dead.

O brave ones surviving, but barely so,
Cruel the pain, crazy the foe,
Why not me, why my best friend,
Will this dark blackness never end?

O brave one coming back from war,
A different person, shaken to the core,
What a reception, some gave you welcome,
Some met you with hatred, treating you like scum.

O brave ones shedding exhausting tears,
Wanting to crawl and hide, for the rest of your years,
Your mind seems scarred, for the rest of your life,
Who'd understand, stories of your strife?

O brave ones feeling, your life's in shatters,
Alive or dead, it hardly any more matters,
You once thought you'd take it, now it's so much more,
You never imagined, this horror of war,

O brave ones thinking, you'd practically died,
Your mind tortured, burned, seared and fried,
Your life feels worthless, over and done.
Your soul seems lost, your spirit gone.

O brave ones whose sacrifice, seems murky, muddy, lost,
Too much pain, too high a cost.
O brave ones mixed up, in the worlds war,
What seems lost to you, I see more.

O brave ones thinking, you aren't so brave,
It's not how you look and feel, it's what you gave,
War isn't pretty, there's no beauty,
But when it counted, you did your duty.

O brave ones hurting, only feeling pain,
Gone your energy, can't get it back again,
Sit with me when you're at your deepest low,
There's a few little things I'd like to show.

O brave ones look, see the children playing?
They're free to walk to school without a slaying,
You helped bring freedom all the way back home,
May I hug you, Soldier? Huge big welcome!

O brave ones look, see, the flowers blowing,
You're the ones that kept our freedom water flowing,
You planted seeds, in the mud and gloom,
You give each of us, a chance to sweetly bloom.

O brave ones breathe, the air so fresh and free,
Your spirit lives on forever, for all eternity,
Receive from me today, a little hopeful ray,
Veteran [Soldier], I deeply wish for you, the best sunshiny day.

O brave ones when, I see your graying hair,
You are the reminder, to go and do and dare,
To walk in your footsteps, with spirit brave and free,
And always leave for others, a better legacy.

O brave ones without you, we just might be,
Wondering if we live in, the land of the free,
Without you there's a chance, we'd each be a slave,
Here with us you make it now, the land of the brave.

God bless America, but God bless you first,
You were His front line, wherever you traversed.
Wars on earth cause, so much tears and grief,
God now shed on you, the deepest sweet relief.

O brave ones showing, how to do my part,
Imitate your courage, your big and generous heart.
When on earth or in Heaven, our first meeting be,
Count me in as one of you, my dearest family.

Amen.