Remembering...

He sits on a park-bench, watching the children
Like colored balloons bobbing over the grass
He catches my eye so I sit down beside him
Suddenly hesitant of what I should ask
So I ask him formally, ‘how are you today?’
And I lean toward him as I hear him say,

“I’m thinking today of my buddy named Jim
And reminding myself again why he died
He died for that little girl there on the swing
And the curly-haired lad coming down the slide
Some days I sit and I can’t help but ponder
The heart-breaking price-tag of freedom; the pain,
But then, as I sit here watching the children
I know that my buddies did not die in vain
I come here to pray for the sons and the daughters
That somehow it seems we easily forget
Leaving their homes and their families; their comforts
Because freedom’s battle is not over yet”

Janet Martin