Kennett resident Frank Williams, like many others in the area, was a friend of one of the soldiers from this area who was killed in Vietnam and whose name is inscribed on the Vietnam Memorial. During a trip to the nation's capitol, Williams visited the memorial and found his friend's name there. The experience moved him 33 years ago to write a poem about his friend.
He wasn't much to look at then,
He wasn't quite a man.
He went to fight for country's right,
In a place called Vietnam.
He fought in rain, he fought in mud.
He fought in trenches filled with blood.
And then one day when on patrol
A deadly bullet took it's toll.
And Stanley's friend, who once was there,
The smell of death was in the air.
And Stanley knew that some grave day
That he might die just this way.
But he won't be worried then,
Because he knew some good friend
Would try to tell his widow why,
Her brave young soldier had to die.
In a far-off, hostile, bitter land
By a bullet from a gun in a stranger's hand.
Some say he died for freedom
Most say he died for naught.
But the Marines lost a big, big man.
For that's what heaven got.
In loving memory of Stanley Kirkland and all the other men who gave their most precious gift, their lives.
Frank Williams
Kennett, Missouri
|
|