Tomorrow, November 11th, in my great nation of Canada, is Remembrance Day, which is observed to remember the service men and women who have fought in the numerous wars to protect our way of life. This day is observed in many other nations under different names, but in Canada it is named Remembrance Day and the red poppy is worn to show our support and appreciation for the lives sacrificed. Below is a link to the well known poem "In Flanders Fields," penned by a Canadian soldier during WWI, "The War To End All Wars."
Another poem I like to think of on this date is 'High Flight' by John Gillespie Magee, born of British and US parents, who joined the Royal Canadian Air Force during WWII
He died flying a Spitfire over the Channel in 1941, but composed the following poem before his death, and mailed it to his parents:
High Flight
"Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air....
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace.
Where never lark, or even eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
– Put out my hand, and touched the face of God."
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