It fluttered in the breeze
A young Marine saluted it, and then
He stood at ease.
⭐
I looked at him in uniform
So young, so tall, so proud
With hair cut square and eyes alert
He’d stand out in any crowd.
⭐
I thought, how many men like him
Had fallen through the years?
How many died on foreign soil?
How many mothers’ tears?
⭐
How many Pilots’ planes shot down?
How many foxholes were soldiers’ graves?
No, Freedom is not free.
⭐
I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still.
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.
⭐
I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant “Amen”
When a flag had draped a coffin
of a brother or a friend.
⭐
I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.
⭐
I thought about a graveyard
at the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No, "Freedom isn’t free!!”
~
~
FREEDOM IS NOT FREE
by
Kelly Strong
©1981
“For background I wrote it as a high school senior in 1981 as an assignment for my JROTC class. I have since completed a 24 career in the Coast Guard and am now a Captain at a major airline.”
These are not my words, I do not claim ownership of them. I am sharing it for 'patriotic' reasons. And because I was in the Military, and I love my country.
Jerry E Smith