Reprinted from Peach Pundit:
It is 11 o’clock in the morning. 91 years ago at this very moment, World War I officially ended. While we call it Veterans Day in this country, most of the world knows it as Remembrance Day. The “War to End All Wars” was not really so. At this moment, 91 years ago, the calm before the real storm began. Lives striving to be put back in order would, within twenty years, come undone again.
The last of Britain’s World War I soldiers died in the past year. And we continue losing the World War II generation. It is odd to think that soon there will be children born who have no direct connection to either of the two great wars of the 20th century.
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
— Lt.-Col. John McCrae (1872 – 1918)