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We all need to do a better job of remembering those who served. Every generation of men in my family back to the Civil War served in one war or another. Many of their stories are now lost. The following is a poem written by my mother that tells the story of my family:
Repetition
by Dorothy Valecourt
I listned to your stories, father
Of a jungle war in the Pilippines,
You were wounded and ran from death.
Home at last, it wasn't long,
When you married a pretty girl
Soon two babies born, the depression,
The mother sick, and while she died
Cried for the ones she left.
The giants met, to plan
Another war. My brother fought,
Thought of his mother in her coffin,
Bourne by friends from school, who went
To war, the bombs dropped.
Laid the land waste, death stalked
Once more, Ardennes, Normandy, the Bulge,
Only rubble left and memories
Lingered, of songs and prayer
And white crosses row on row.
I listened to your stories brother,
Of the cold and snow in France, Christmas,
You were wounded and ran from death.
This was the war to end all wars!
But on its tail came Korea,
Pork Chop Hill, a baptism of fire
and death. I married and in the west
Gave birth. the babies grew
On the legends told. Of the
Civil War and my grandmother's tales
Of her uncles who lice infested
Returned from prison.
A husband in the Spanish War. Remember
The Main! and yellow journalism,
A war not wanted, not won
By Teddy and his rough-riders. Again
From an alien land, a knock on the door
By a little lady in Washington
"Help my people!" she said
Viet Nam, was this one word
Or two? What were we fighting for:
No one seemed to know
Who lost, who won, will history tell?
I listened to your stories son
Of the jungle war in Viet Nam
You were wounded and ran from death.
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