I watched a movie of the boys coming back from World War Two,

To be very honest for the men of Vietnam it made me very blue,

Why they called them the boys that fought that war I don’t know,

They were war heroes no doubt as they often fought toe to toe,

For four years the U.S. was militarily involved in the “Great War,”

Just ten short years later our country sadly took on even more,

As our military advisers went to South Asia they thought it right,

In nineteen hundred and sixty five we sent thousands off to fight,

The truth of that war is lost to most Americans that didn’t care,

It mattered deeply to the men of America that had to fight there,

Vietnam with American troops involved stretched on for ten years,

That most of us weren’t welcomed home has caused many tears,

The percentage dead is exactly the same as World War II’s deaths,

As long as I live I won’t let Vietnam be the war our country forgets,

I understand American protestors hate of us going to war again,

And why did the hate for servicemen and disrespecting us begin?

We were called men by our country and those that hated us so,

We Vietnam “men” were 22 and WW II was 26 if you care to know,

Perhaps had we been boys we would have been welcomed home,

Grown men should stand on their own needing no one to stand alone,

I walked home alone because even my family didn’t care to come,

In my home town many knew I was in Nam yet I was welcomed by one,

An angel of mercy and love that had one thought that I was home,

So many died from my hometown most in my neighborhood alone,

If only we had a welcome home even belated is better than none,

Had we men or non boys of youth had support we could have won,

I’ve cried over spilt milk for my fellowmen too often, even me some,

So many should be thankful for what we damaged men have done,

Many of us have gone home now to a welcome home in heaven,

Gathered to drink beer plus wine and eat bread of heaven’s leaven,

Each man will be greeted at heavens gate by a countryman of spirit,

Along with family that loved us perhaps being loved will become habit,

Those precious teens that lost limb, youth, and innocence will be whole,

Youth is a tragic loss but even more-so innocence lost takes a tragic toll,

I’d swear from looking in the hardened vets you’d think they had no soul,

I asked them to pray with me but when “what for?” came I failed to extol,

Instead I chose to pray for them in hopes their humanity returns,

It was hell as it seems our goal was to prove that everything burns,

Napalm and agent orange were our new secret weapons of destruction,

Defoliate plants and cremate every living human all in one application,

I wonder I do, do protestors of past actually believe soldiers want war,

Draftees had a one in three chance of dying for those that kept score,

The saddest fact is that sixty one percent were under age twenty one,

Seeing angels was a common thing when a young soldier’s life was done,

I’d swear if all was quiet you’d hear the sounds of large wings in the night,

We saw the silhouette of an angel lifting off against a blue moon in full flight,

So many held a teddy bear as he laid on the stretcher away the moment,

I saw them smile in happiness as their soul left behind war’s torment,

I was a man when I came home but most should have come home boys,

It’s saddened me so much that most should have been home finding joy,

Nay it wasn’t to be as the sad cruelties of war crucified their innocence,

They paid their youth to America and America paid their youth a pittance,

Don’t think I’m not a Patriot as I fought hard and I am proud that I did,

My disgust is in the youth of my generation that spit upon us then hid,

Now they deny the history and have tried to destroy film with their face,

Perhaps they are the same that deny the Holocaust ever took place,

I’m lost in this rhyme as it rambles so much disgust from my mind,

Worry not America for the writer of such lines will one day be blind,

To scribe no more, to rant no more upon paper but aloud to be heard,

For the sad Vietnam Vet, the sad eyed Vet starving, I have one word.

HERO!

The end.