all grown up

a holocaust liberator spoke at our school today. i was asked to write something for him.

they all start as children.

innocent beings with no decided future,
pure souls not yet tarnished by what is to come.

they grow older,
begin to understand life beyond our borders,
begin to wonder how we can live so differently
than a country only an ocean away.

they become watchers,
standing aside and looking on at the world
as it spins into inevitable destruction.

soon enough,
they become tired of watching.

they see strong men and women,
who fight and have fought.

they hear their stories,
some tragic, some heroic,
some an even mix of the two.

they begin to wonder
if they could have a few words
in a book with such greatness as war.

they begin to wonder
if the little kid who played with submarines
could become a navy lieutenant.

or if the kid who sailed his own paper airplanes
could become an airforce pilot.

they train,
try and prepare themselves for an expericence any person,
citizen or soldier,
would be blindsided by.

they will throw their lives on the line;
not as a sacrifice,
but as an instinct.

they will take that bullet
just to make sure,
we remember;

the best
and most beautiful things in the world,
cannot be seen or even touched,
they must be felt with the heart.

our hearts will never forget.