Perhaps we were meant to be affected by poetry just as we are affected by love. We want to be moved by it. Poetry, like love, produces feelings and emotions that transplant thoughts. Love can be and is the most powerful and enduring force in the universe if you let it. In the end, after all is said and done, love and its remnants are the only things that really matter. Love transcends space and time and might be the only thing that can be taken into the afterlife. Poetry and love go hand in hand. We can find poetry in almost everything we see. Albeit a small flower, a baby bird, a crying woman, a dying soldier or a fallen leaf. I hope that some of these poems and poetic short prose stay with you long after you have read them. Long after the servicemen and servicewomen who wrote them have passed by this life.

Sample Poems:

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"Lost Baby, Lost Daddy"

Little shoes never worn,

New pram, never pushed,

Painted nursery, quiet now,

Once warm cot, only cold now,

Mothers heart, empty now,

Fathers heart, broken inside.

She never saw Daddy,

He was buried a long way from home.

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"Love in Small Places"

Love hides in small places

It hides in the heart and guards the memories of lovers and loved ones

It hides in the hands held between a mother and child

It hides in the kiss between two lovers

In the gaze between friends

In the hugs between us

Love is as perennial as the grass

Love is the only thing that can make you smile when you are sad

Love is in the ashes of a soldier’s urn.