Sunday, May 29, 2011

Lest We Forget

"Your silent tents of green We deck with fragrant flowers;
Yours has the suffering been, The memory shall be ours."

~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow



They went with songs to the battle, they were young.
Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

~ Laurence Binyon: For the Fallen 1914

9 comments:

~Kim at Golden Pines~ said...

Another lovely post and verse Jo! I think people are forgetting what this holiday is all about--We really need to remember those who gave their lives so we could have a better one...

黄清华 Wong Ching Wah said...

Solemn beauty, a beautiful posts and thoughts !

Unknown said...

I spent the day at a cemetery very much like the one pictured. It's a ausome reminder of all those soldiers that have faught for the freedoms that we now enjoy. The lines of headstones seem to go on forever in every direction.

cathy@home said...

Lovely post lest we forget

MadSnapper said...

beautiful and yes we will remember them.

DJan said...

Remembering the fallen... I was in a graveyard yesterday and looking at all the flags... just one little corner of the country where this scene is being repeated everywhere.

Diane at My Cottage Garden said...

Beautiful poem and image here. In the USA, there is Memorial Day in the spring and Veteran's Day in the fall as well, I believe?

This image reminds me of Arlington Cemetary. We've been there a couple of times and it's truly amazing.

Patsy said...

We must never forget our men and women that died to make us free.
Patsy

Barbara Anne said...

What a lovely and sobering poem.

There is an amazing quilt that has the last two lines of this poem stitched around its border. The quilt was made by Josephine Ratcliff of Preston, Lancashire, England in 1991 for the Church of St. John, Preston. "Sunset Cross", as the quilt is titled, hangs in the chapel of the Queen's Loyal Lancashire Regiment in Preston Parish Church. It is pictured in the book, "The Patchwork Pilgrimage" by Jill Liddell.

Ta!