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A Few Good Men |
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Only a few special men
In all the words poets pen
Know what cruel war's like,
Have seen death pitch its fatal strike.
Stood stalwart at the plate;
Dared an evil foe's hate berate.
Good men,
Again and again
Put their very lives on the line
For revered precepts Divine,
Breathe pure courage's finite breath,
Walk through the valley of shadowed death.
Only a few special men
In all the words poets pen
Answer their country's call with distinction,
Wield liberty's sword in heroic affirmation,
To death's cruel threat thumb their nose,
For the sound of distant drums a brave man knows.
They have fought for right in honor's action,
Contended for freedom's administration.
Have felt cruel war's carnage real
Coursing through his body shards of steel
Felt the gory thrust in purest agony,
Unadulterated,
Uncompromised,
Misery,
With the world's destiny clouding his face,
Cold fears gripping embrace,
Witnessing up close truly venomous hate,
Feeling on their skin the grim touch of fate,
Walked head held high through wars jungled pit,
Eluding bullets with their name on it.
Only a few special men
In all the words poets pen
Truly laugh in the face of death,
Smell its cankered breath,
Hovering in that valley ever near
Hearing plaintive sounds only the dying hear.
Have seen darkening shadows in an enemy's eyes,
Joined with a brother's plaintive cries.
Who will ever forget,
The oppressors en-angered hit,
Still shed rivers of tears after 33 years
Still feel the demon's fears,
Still in sweet and sour dreams pouring down
Wetting a soldier's soul, foot to crown.
Only a few special men
In all the words poets pen
In sweet memory of the Nam still smile
For brothers made in Nam's fetid mile
Feeling still a windblown war's wafting
Eternally drafting,
A battle's confusion yet today baffling.
Mourn the loss of a boy's values
A forever loss all innocence eschews,
The vile horror of it yet cannot lose,
That which his good heart evermore construes... |
By
Gary Jacobson
Copyright 2001
Listed
June 3, 2010 |
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About
Author...
In 1966-67, Gary Jacobson served with B Co
2nd/7th 1st Air Cavalry in Vietnam as a combat
infantryman and is the recipient of the Purple
Heart.
Gary, who resides in Idaho writes stories he
hopes are never forgotten, perhaps compelled by
a Vietnamese legend that says, "All poets are
full of silver threads that rise inside them as
the moon grows large." So Gary says he
writes because "It is that these silver
threads are words poking at me � I must let them
out. I must! I write for my brothers who cannot
bear to talk of what they've seen and to educate
those who haven't the foggiest idea about the
effect that the horrors of war have on
boys-next-door."
Visit Gary Jacobson's site for more information
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