Ode to the soldier

When you see interviews of soldiers they often say that it is not their call to make decisions but it is their call to perform their duty. I admire these people who will sacrifice life and limb for duty without asking questions. Freedom of speech is not a cheap thing. A lot of people have died with the hope that people might express what they think and can ask questions. Words mean nothing, its actions that speak loud. Saying I care about soldiers and using them without plan or thought is indecent considering that a soldier speaks very less but acts all the time in a country's interest whatever they may be.

A Soldier’s Cemetery

by John William Streets (killed and missing in action on 1 July 1916 aged 31)
Connaught British Military Cemetery, Somme battlefield near Thiepval (copyright www.greatwar.co.uk)

Behind that long and lonely trenched line
To which men come and go, where brave men die,
There is a yet unmarked and unknown shrine,
A broken plot, a soldier’s cemetery.

There lie the flower of youth, the men who scorn’d
To live (so died) when languished Liberty:
Across their graves flowerless and unadorned
Still scream the shells of each artillery.

When war shall cease this lonely unknown spot
Of many a pilgrimage will be the end,
And flowers will shine in this now barren plot
And fame upon it through the years descend:
But many a heart upon each simple cross
Will hang the grief, the memory of its loss.