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john k zimmerman

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Member Since: Nov, 2002

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Machine Gunner
by john k zimmerman → (All Poetry by john k zimmerman)
  
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the poem says it all


Poem Artwork


On decoration Day Grampa
would put on his blue blazer with his metals,
And the cap that said “Canadian Corps”
Pick up a bundle of Union Jacks
and go to the cemetery.
There he’d decorate the veterans graves
soldiers of the great war

When once I asked what the patch on the shoulder meant
a light blue rectangle with a navy blue arrow,
“I was a machine gunner.”
Was all that he would say

He never spoke of the mud and the trenches,
Or shooting the enemy down, he never spoke
Of the counter battery fire, or the wounded
Or the dying, or the shelling, or the gas...
And it was only years after he died
That I learned the he carried a piece of Krupp
Steel in his hip to his grave...

He never spoke of war at all
But every May he’d decorate
The veteran’s graves--
A Soldier of the great war

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 Reviews of "Machine Gunner"
Reviewed by Nancy D.
Reviewed on February 22, 2003
John,
A picture can say a thousand words, but what your grandfather went through and kept within him is one of the sadest and heartbreaking "hell" he experienced. My father still talks about it today. Excellent write.
Nancy

Reviewed by jing javier
Reviewed on February 22, 2003
nice piece...

Reviewed on February 22, 2003
Very immense in emotion. Powerful write!

Sandie Angel :o)

Reviewed by Tinka Boukes
Reviewed on February 22, 2003
very powerful write about a soldier of the great war....my Dad was in world war 2...and had some metals but he never told me his daughter what they meant...my brother has them framed....
Love Tinka

Reviewed by Erica Ivory
Reviewed on February 22, 2003
John.. You must have fond memories of your Grandfather to write this sweet, powerful poem.


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