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April Winner <strong>No</strong>: 2<br />
FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE<br />
April Winner <strong>No</strong>:1<br />
WE ALL FEEL IT<br />
by Christopher Boyce, Ex RAF Gulf War<br />
1990/91 Veteran<br />
WHENEVER you feel down and depressed,<br />
whether you were Army, Royal Air Force,<br />
Royal Navy or Royal Marines,<br />
no matter who, what, where, when or how ,<br />
we lived as one, we fought as one and we feel as<br />
one.<br />
Every time a fellow brother or sister dies or is<br />
injured no matter what,<br />
WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
Think back to the news or the Facebook pages<br />
or Twitter feeds that you have read,<br />
VETERAN WITH NO FAMILY TO BE<br />
BURIED ALONE<br />
or<br />
WW2 HERO TO HAVE NO ONE THERE FOR<br />
THEM<br />
How many of you wish you could be there ?<br />
How many do go and show their respect?<br />
I bet if you could every single veteran would be<br />
at every single fellow veterans funeral till the<br />
day it is their funeral !!<br />
Why? Because WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
<strong>The</strong> next time you turn on the TV or look at the<br />
Facebook page or Twitter feed you see that 100,<br />
500 a 1000 people turned up, the local Royal<br />
British Legion Standard Bearer went along,<br />
How many of you smile then thinking "we gave<br />
that brother or sister a good send off"? Because<br />
WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
Whether we are Old or Young,<br />
whether we are bedridden, in a Wheelchair,<br />
Limbless, Blind, Deaf, Suffer Mental Illness,<br />
PTSD,<br />
Have been poisoned by cocktails of drugs that<br />
supposed to save us, keep us safe and well ,<br />
what ever our conditions,<br />
WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
So when you receive that letter from the<br />
Veterans Agency, SPVA, ATOS, DWP, ESA or<br />
whoever and it say <strong>No</strong>, Never give in,<br />
<strong>No</strong> Retreat, <strong>No</strong> Surrender, you fight and fight,<br />
you write and write, you ring and you talk, but<br />
remember this,<br />
Never let them grind you down,<br />
Why Because WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
So whether we served a day, a month, a year, a<br />
decade or a lifetime we are members of thee<br />
greatest band of brothers and sisters we will<br />
always answer the call,<br />
And Why? Because WE ALL FEEL IT.<br />
WE WILL REMEMBER THEM.<br />
Win This<br />
Fantastic Title<br />
Great War centenary books fell like shells but Before Action,<br />
Charlotte Zeepvats meticulous biography of young war poet<br />
<strong>No</strong>el Hodgson, hit hardest...Usually Zeepvat writes about royalty;<br />
here she describes true nobility.<br />
Tip-tap whisper steps<br />
On limed splint<br />
Boarded oak,<br />
Sang stained apron<br />
Of blade creased starch.<br />
Cauled birth sheet<br />
Set square<br />
Unto the dimming living light,<br />
Sigh and moan<br />
For mother dear<br />
Beneath angel bedded arch.<br />
<strong>The</strong> cut and thrust<br />
Of hero battle<br />
Is dead, undone.<br />
<strong>No</strong> man here<br />
Will sabre swing<br />
This sallowed night,<br />
<strong>The</strong>y are but flesh,<br />
Blinded in eyes<br />
Seeking heaven’s light.<br />
Only bonnet maid<br />
Is witness<br />
To their final earthly plight.<br />
In this haven of healing<br />
A moving shadow is clear,<br />
It’s halo lit<br />
‘Neath glowing golden lamp.<br />
Beneath humble acropolis<br />
Athena seeks her wisdom<br />
As the owl scours<br />
<strong>The</strong> burnished fields of battle.<br />
Devotion in hair twined armlet<br />
Girths a wrist<br />
Extends the hand of mercy.<br />
For on this Crimean dawn<br />
<strong>The</strong> nightingale has risen<br />
And awakened the winged nurse<br />
Upon which healing history<br />
Will be forever borne.<br />
Terry Buchanan<br />
To have a chance at winning this fabulous book, simply email<br />
your poetry to: jane@sandbagtimes.com<br />
| 26 www.sandbagtimes.co.uk
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