Thank You for Your Service

By V. Mitchell

An old man approached me

A tear in his eye

I’d stopped at a grocery

A coffee to buy

He thanked me profusely

While shaking my hand

For service to country

He thought it was grand

He certainly stunned me

With gesture and word

For kindness ‘til then

It was something unheard

The time – mid-September

Of Two Thousand One

For twenty years before

The uniform I wore

Elicited no cheer

From a stranger to hear

I watched Huntly & Brinkley

And Reasoner and Cronkite

They showed us the combat

And brought home the fight

The fight was in Asia

In the jungles of ‘Nam

The fight was in Kansas

And all over the land

Young men they were drafted

Their hair was cut short

Others served of tradition

For blood ties run deep

Nurses tended the wounded

And tried not to weep

The front line was everywhere

The front line was nowhere

So to measure our progress

The kill count was key

We fought there forever

Many lives were cut short

They went off to war

But the uniforms they wore

Brought nought but a jeer

From a stranger to hear

I signed up in college

For a career in the air

That war was behind us

But it haunted us still

For so many seasons

Olive drab we foreswore

Our utility uniforms

Deemed unfit to be viewed

So it’s not without reason

That first Thank You was dear

By the end of the ‘aughts

Surreality ruled

Clad in battle fatigues

On the way to my base

I could not buy a coffee

Someone already paid

No, No – I wanted to cry

There were others before me

Who received not a choice

And were given no “Thanks!”

For two decades and more

The uniform I wore

Elicited no cheer

From a stranger to hear

My Class A’s and cammies

Are now packed away

Tho a “Thank you for serving”

Can still make my day

Now custom, it’s more than a blip

But I served in the old

And I served thru the flip

So I close with a caution

For us to uphold

Not Vilification

Not Deification

Can ever be right for

The health of the nation