Because you are a Hero

I know you tried so hard
To be my best friend
To be my honored brother
The one who didn’t hit me
The one who put himself in front
Not afraid to take the bullet
To keep me safe from harm
To serve with honor and pride
To treat me like your equal
Though I can never be
Because you are a Hero
You gave your life for mine
I haven’t lived up to your sacrifice
I have only wanted to be with you
To lay among my brothers
In the Garden made of stone
For each day you are gone
I have to stand alone
My memories of you
Never fade
They hurt
They make me cry
I weep for you
I want my brothers back
Standing by my side
Till we reach the end
Of the long dark roads
We walked

Failing my Band of Brothers

I did not see combat
I wasn’t there when
My brothers died.

I wasn’t there
To lay them
To rest.

Rather I was home
Trying to do what
Would honor them
The best.

I feel everyday
Through my tears
And pain
I failed.

I haven’t lived
A great life
At least
According
To me.

For my Band of Brothers
Are no longer here
To tell me what
They think of me.

The day that never comes

I can hear their screams
Crying out in the night
The pain, the dismay
These cries are not silent
To me

They cry out for peace
They cry out for relief
They cry out for attention
Until no one answers

Then the one's who loved them
Cry out at their bedside
Cry out at their graveside
Cry out for the one's they've lost

It's too late now
But I still hear them screaming out
I don't want their pain
I don't want their future
I don't want their agony

And on the weak days
My body doesn't really care
It absorbs it all
Till I want to run and hide

In the hopes it won't bother me anymore
But that day never comes.

Memorial Day

Come Memorial Day there will be
No mail
No school
Plenty of deep thought
Plenty of shopping sales
Plenty of barbeque
Plenty of Meals for Veterans

What there won't be is the ability to talk to my friends again.

I served my country

I didn’t squirm
I didn’t stray
I never thought
To walk away.

I took my oath
Where others stood
Many have come
To do some good.

Within each minute
Within each step
Blood, sweat & tears
Each & every rep.

And so I stay
And so I tried
To serve my nation
With Honor & Pride.

It's OK Daddy

It’s OK Daddy

I’m not afraid of the dark anymore
I am going into the dark my eyes wide open
My tears are for those who have gone before me
Not for me for I am overburdened and exhausted
Ready to go

When my time at the pearly gates comes
I will take my medicine from the only one
Whom I will allow to judge me from now on
No one and I mean no one will do that to me ever again
But him

I shall stand up proudly and proclaim my right, my choice
If I never meet you inside that will be the way it is
I shall be laid with my brothers some I knew
Many I did not know but my brothers just the same
Not the kind who beat upon me to toughen me up
Rather Daddy, they stood in front of me to lessen my pain

It’s OK Daddy
I’m not afraid anymore.

He wore Angels Wings

He wore angels wings long before he died
He carried me through Basic
When I could no longer carry myself

He protected me from harm
As if I was his little brother
He listened when I needed to vent
As if he was my personal counselor
He prayed for me
As if he was my personal minister
Even when I couldn’t pray for myself

The day he was taken home
I heard an angel cry
Weeping his name
He was my brother
With a different last name
But my brother just the same

To this day I can no longer even think of his name
Without tears from heaven falling down
For he wore angels wings long before he died.

Your suicide choice leaves me alone in the abyss

4 am, my mind is screaming aloud, my nightmares bare for the world to see
I see you, you’ve long since gone to a better peaceful world, but you are still here in my mind
It only hurts when I see you, when you reach out to me inside the darkness of my mind
My tears as real as the day I laid you to rest in the garden of stone
No matter what I do, no matter where I go, like a ghost you are there
Haunting my dreams when I least expect it

I could go months without you then suddenly there you are in my dreams
You hold me, you show me the love you always freely shared with me
I had no idea the pain you were hiding inside of you, till the day you expressed it in a silent sign of defiance

Forcing me to say goodbye before I was ready to let you go
Which is usually where my dreams take flight
The night before you left me alone
Our passions running free, our bodies entwined
Your love surrounding my empty, lonely soul one last time

If I could only let you go inside my mind
But there you are, begging me to save you from yourself
And once I hear you in my dreams my worlds collide yet again
My loss, my guilt for not realizing how I wasn’t there for you
In the way you had been there for me, again and again

And every part of you that haunts my dreams
Takes my soul to a deep darkened abyss
As if you are waiting for me somewhere
As lonely as I felt when you weren’t there
Until you surrounded me again with the love you had to share

And each moment since is like a dagger filled with guilt, shame
Every song, every memory revolves around you
I can’t outrun you no matter how hard I try
No matter what I do, I feel you waiting for me in the abyss
Trying to take me around the bend, so we can be together yet again.

Five Favors:Short Story

Jack laid on the bed in his one room apartment the feeling of cold steel in his right hand, he was thinking about things in his life.  How he had failed his parents by being a screw up, by failing his brothers in arms by being mentally unstable when they needed him most and by failing to provide for the children he probably never should have even had with his second ex.

“Dear God it just takes five things to make this right, just five thoughts or five favors or five memories to let go of.”

In his mind, those five things were five favors for others.

1. Make a will and trust for his children
2. Pay for his own funeral costs
3. Pay his respects to his brothers families when possible
4. Donate his valuables to a charity
5. Say good bye to his parents

Most of these were obvious but many wouldn’t think those things would be important to most with this frame of mind.  He wanted desperately to express how clearly he was thinking and not insane at the time of his death by suicide.  He wanted to be remember for something positive not the fact that he chose suicide over living an incomplete life.  Some things in life are harder than others for those of us who don’t understand the choice in the first place.

Jack was about to finish his favors as he picked up his cell when he remembered something, he forgot on of his brothers family members.




He dialed a number in his cell, “Hey don’t hang up its Jack.  Yeah I know I wasn’t supposed to call you anymore but I’m sober and needed to apologize for your brothers death, I should have never talked him into joining with me.  Thanks, and I know you don’t want to hear this but, I love you still Case.  Tell the kids I miss them, bye.”

With that he wiped away a tear and hung up then dialed one more number...

“Hi Dad, yeah I know it’s late I just wanted to say I can’t make it for Thanksgiving this year tell Mom I love her alright.  Hey Dad, I love you too.  No, No I’m fine just tired.  No, I just haven’t been sleeping well, yeah I am taking my meds Dad.  I’m just feeling so wound up and tired at the same time.  You take care of yourself old man, I gotta hang up so you can go back to sleep. Bye.”

Jack laid back staring at the ceiling tiles with the glow in the dark stars on them, drew one more breath and placed the gun to his head, to his chest and with a deep breath there was silence once more.

“Hey Jack you forgot me didn’t you?” A voice in the darkness called out to him.

Screaming out loud, “I gave you five favors now leave me alone to do this.”

“Have you forgotten one thing?  When have you bared the wait of my chains?  When have you prophetized my words?  Have you honored your father, mother and children for me?”

“You will not forsake my soul for this failure, I have given all I have left.  My soul is broken, tired and empty.  If you don’t let me into the heavenly gates, I will lay with my fallen brothers till the end of time.”

Confessions of a suicidal survivor

I breathe you in
Your darkened soul
Your entrancing embrace

I breathe you out
Your enlightened ideals
Your enabling desires

I breathe you every day
Your thoughts
Your desires

I curse you every day
Your humiliation
Your degredation

I know you are present inside me
I know you want my mind
I know you wish you took me
I know you wish you had forgiven my failures

And yet, every day I think of you, your darkness, your sinister motives, your neediness to consume me

And the one thing you don't know....I am still here.

The Christmas Soldier

From the Christmas Ledger December 25, 1967:

“Announcing the birth of boy to Jason and Amanda Walker, seven pounds fifteen ounces.  His parents called him their Christmas miracle having lost two babies before they named him John Thomas Walker after the father’s deceased father who was recently killed in Vietnam.  CSM J.T. Walker was serving in the US Army 1^st Signal Brigade having been recently reassigned due to a knee injury while serving with the 173d Airborne Brigade.  His troopers called him “The Christmas Soldier” because he too was born on Christmas Day.”

That was a day Amanda Walker would never forget but not for the reasons one might think rather it was also the day her only son left her on December 25, 1991.  He had served in the US Army like his Grandpa, his Great-Grandpa and his Dad all had before him each making their own sacrifice.  Two paid the ultimate sacrifice and one came home scarred by the things he saw having served as an Army Ranger Sgt. Jason Walker (retired) injured during a black ops mission that remains classified to date.

On December 25, 1991, Specialist J.T Walker made the ultimate sacrifice for his brethren during an ambush.  Having been severely injured he conjured up the strength to pull all four other men to safety and kill all the enemy attackers that were converging on them.  He died of his injuries at approximately 2048 on the aforementioned date surrounded by those men whom he sacrificed so much to save.

December 25, 2011 2^nd Lt. Jamie D. Holmes was hit by an IED while riding in a convoy with her driver Specialist James T. Hunter Jr who was killed instantly was injured.  When she arrived at the medical operations center she asked where the soldier was who pulled her from the burning Humvee.

“I’m sorry Lt. but no one was with you when the medics brought you in.”

“No, he was there he said he wouldn’t let go of me no matter what, he held my wound closed till I hear the medics arrive, didn’t they help him he was bleeding out too!”

They calmed her down and reported to their chain of command what she reported.  Everyone else that was debriefed from that attack all reported the same thing an injured male soldier who held onto them and protected them until help arrived.  Each describing a similar soldier with an injury to his abdomen area. His name tag read, “Walker”.

For generations there have been reports of a soldier named Walker giving aid and protection from harm on Christmas Day.  Amanda Walker still holds the entire collection the Walker family has received since JT’s Great-Grandpa had died on Christmas Day during WWI.

Letters that all said the same thing in so many words, “I owe your family a debt I can never repay for one of your own saved my life…”

Bleed me out

Bleed me out

Make my life mean something

Don’t let me feel so empty, so hollow inside.

Accept my pain

Bring it to the spotlight so others might understand

Don’t let them be judgmental of those like me going forward.

Make me ash

And bury me among my brothers, my true family

So I no longer feel empty, lonely and afraid to be.

These are not hollow words

These are words of someone with a strength inside you know nothing of

These are choices made out of love and pain, may you never know the pain of making.

Deep inside we know it’s wrong

But our soul is darkened by death and loss

And the pain cannot be medicated or talked away.

And when we take the final walk in the Garden of Stone

May we find the peace we no longer knew or felt

Inside our minds are at peace once more as the world plays the hand it’s dealt.

I am a Disabled Veteran

I am a Disabled Veteran

Please don't look at me that way
When you ask me where I served
I want to land one on your head
Don't look at my license plate
And question my disability
All you really need to know is
My Country that I stood up for
And said my oath has said

"This Veteran is Disabled of this fact there is no contest

  For he stood at the alter and honored his friends last request

  To lay him in the meadow,  the one filled with stone

  Where their brothers lie in peace

  The ones who stood before

  To take an oath without regret

  So you can stand there free

  And judge them still without a thought

  Of the price of pain they hide inside."

Unforgivable

I broke it
Smashed it to pieces
And you forgave me

I promised, I lied
Fell into the darkness
And you stayed by my side

Then I broke the rules
And you knelt beside me
Holding my hand trying to forgive me

Now you visit me daily
Among my brothers
In the Garden Of Stone

Trying to understand
Trying to make sense of it all

Even though what I did was

Unforgivable.

PTSD, Mental Health Disorders and You

Who do you think you are?

Do you think you can just take and take from me without giving back?

Am I to just surrender to you as if you are my new God?

Should I just give in each time you return for vengeance?

What makes you the boss of me?

Who died and made you king?

You don’t get to run my life anymore

You don’t get to ruin my world as you think you know it

You don’t get to destroy me from within

I no longer fear your pain

I no longer fear your anger, your rage

I no longer cry each time you evoke a memory

I no longer worship at your throne of pain

I no longer seek vengeance in your name

You have no hold on me

Though we meet from time to time

I shall bear your scars no more

Rather I wear them without trying to hide

You are a badge I have earned in my life

I shall take you to my grave

You will take nothing more from me.