Memorial Day Epitaph

Here on the battlefield lay our heroes
From Salem Poor and Peter Salem on Bunker Hill
To Andre Borden dead from a mine in Iraq
And the brother who shot himself last week, despondent.
From Barney's black sailors on Bladensburg Road facing the redcoats
Who brought Napoleon's legions low, to
the 54th Massachussetts, the Red Ball Express, the 9th Cavalry.
The old 24th--outnumbered 50-1 yet besting the Red Chinese and North Koreans...
...the soul brothers, grim and enduring the Viet Cong, at Ka Sanh.
Here they lay, so we may be free.
Here they lay, so that we shall have dignity.
Here they lay, so the nation that shunned and reviled them,
Shall not perish from the earth.