This is probably more suited to Memorial Day than Veterans Day. But, it will ring true for those who got spit on, and worse, in US Airports and those who wish to remember the noble, mostly kid, hero's that never got the chance to become veterans.
If you are able,
save for them a place
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.
~Major Michael Davis O'Donnell (MIA, 1972)
1 January 1970
Dak To, Vietnam
