An Cosantóir June 2018 www.dfmagazine.ie
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(Rifleman Shay Singleton, UN Checkpoint 6-38 Alpha, Haddathah Village, Irish Area of Operations - Winter 1988)
I will always remember
that Peacekeepers, like Icarus, sometimes soar
too close to the flames of a violent sun,
that warriors are drawn by the gods
to the night-time's phosphorous tracer
bouncing like molten solder
under a welder's torch,
that glory and honour take many forms,
and a Greek falling at Thermopylae
was as real and important to antiquity
as you buying shoes for a near barefoot child
and your reading these words now.
So these lines are for the soldier you were,
for that Peacekeeper all those years ago
because you've often wondered
if the months you spent in that burning land
were worth the time away from home
and your family's fret,
what the things you did and witnessed meant,
for though all warriors seek the glories of the Spartan
and armies, for millennia, have
ploughed the soil of Lebanon,
history shows that enemies aren't
always victims of a war,
the poor and innocent too are taken
by the sword.
But, even warriors are known to
save lives,
like the day you refused to let a
schoolboy die
or the greatest pain explode
among that winter's classroom,
or his home.
Though he thought better
than gift a secret hand-grenade to you - an Irish soldier,
you gave him every dollar you could muster from your
pockets
for the deadly contents of his bag.
Cpl Michael J. Whelan
Cpl Michael J Whelan is the author of PeacekeePeR, a collection of poems inspired by his service as an
Irish Peacekeeper in lebanon and Kosovo. It was published by Doire Press in April 2016,
ISBN: 978-1-907682-46-9 and priced €12 with FREE Worldwide shipping. www.doirepress.com
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