Kipling On 9/11

Like Borepatch, I'm still angry. This photo sums up why. I get angrier every time I look at it or watch those horrible videos. I look at it often to remind me of just how personal and horrific the attacks on that day were.

That is an American plumeting to his death on that evil day. Whether he jumped or simply fell, trying to escape the killing smoke and flames, matters not at all. That is my countryman. A fellow American. My brother, my father, my son. Killed by evil men who rest not to this day. A fate he didn't choose but accepted when it was thrust upon him. Caught unawares by the cowardly.

10 years.  Time has failed to dim my wrath or that of my fellows. I count not the timid, weak, cowardly and apologetic. They are not my brothers and sisters. This man is my brother. Those who lost their lives on that day and those who selflessly gave theirs on the battlefields fighting against the rising tide of evil are. Yes, I served on that day and many after. No, I will never be worthy of their sacrifices, honor and bravery.

I will remember. I will honor them. I will never surrender. For their memory if for no other reason.


Covenent
1914

We thought we ranked above the chance of ill.
Others might fall, not we, for we were wise
Merchants in freedom. So, of our free-will
We let our servants drug our strength with lies.
The pleasure and the poison had its way
On us as on the meanest, till we learned
That he who lies will steal, who steals will slay.
Neither God's judgment nor man's heart was turned.

Yet there remains His Mercy--to be sought
Through wrath and peril till we cleanse the wrong
By that last right which our forefathers claimed
When their Law failed them and its stewards were bought.
This is our cause. God help us, and make strong
Our will to meet Him later, unashamed!

May it ever be so. May our enemies, those who attacked us and killed us and those that remain taste the bitter tears of death down to the least of them. May we remember and meet our Maker and our Forefathers unashamed. The fight goes on.

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