General George S Patton Jnr - Dead Pals

Dickey, we've trained and fit and died,

Yes, drilled and drunk and bled,

And shared our chuck and our bunks in life.

Why part us now we're dead?


Would I rot so nice away from you,

Who has been my pal for a year?

Will Gabriel's trumpet waken me,

If you ain't there to hear?


Will a parcel of bones in a wooden box

Remind my Ma of me?

Or isn't it better for her to think

Of the kid I used to be?


It's true some preacher will get much class

A tellin' what guys we've been,

So, the fact that we're not sleeping with pals,

Won't cut no ice for him.


They'll yell, 'Hurrah!'

And every spring they'll decorate our tomb,

But we'll be absent at the spot

We sought, and found, our doom.


The flags and flowers won't bother us,

Our free souls will be far --

Holdin' the line in sunny France

Where we died to win the war.


Fact is, we need no flowers and flags

For each peasant will tell his son,

'Them graves on the hill is the graves of

Yanks, Who died to lick the Hun.'


And instead of comin' every spring

To squeeze a languid tear,

A friendly people's loving care

Will guard us all the year.

General George S Patton Jnr

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dead-pals/