The embers glowed softly, and in their dim light,
I gazed round the room
and I cherished the sight.
My wife was asleep, her head on my chest,
my daughter
beside me, angelic in rest.
Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white,
transforming the yard to a
winter delight.
The sparkling lights in the tree I believe,
completed the magic
that was Christmas Eve.
My eyelids were heavy, my breathing was deep,
secure and surrounded by
love I would sleep.
In perfect contentment, or so it would seem,
so I slumbered,
perhaps I started to dream.
The sound wasn't loud, and it wasn't too near,
but I opened my eyes when
it tickled my ear.
Perhaps just a cough, I didn't quite know,
then the sure
sound of footsteps outside in the snow.
My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear,
and I crept to the door just
to see who was near.
Standing out in the cold and the dark of the night,
a lone
figure stood, his face weary and tight.
A Marine, I puzzled, some twenty years old,
all dressed in cammies,
huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled,
standing
watch over me, and my wife and my child.
"What are you doing?" I asked without fear,
"Come in this moment, it's
freezing out here!
Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve,
you
should be at home on a cold Christmas Eve!"
For barely a moment I saw his eyes shift,
away from the cold and the snow
blown in drifts.
To the window that danced with a warm fire's light.
Then he
sighed and he said "Its really all right,
I'm out here by choice. I'm here every
night."
"It's my duty to stand at the front of the line,
that separates you from
the darkest of times.
No one had to ask or beg or implore me,
I'm proud to stand
here like my fathers before me.
My Gramps died at 'Pearl on a day in December,"
then he sighed, "That's a
Christmas 'Gram always remembers."
My dad stood his watch in the jungles of
'Nam',
and now it is my turn and so, here I am.
I've not seen my own son in more
than a while,
but my wife sends me pictures, he's sure got her smile.
Then he bent and he carefully pulled from his bag,
The red, white, and
blue... an American flag.
"I can live through the cold and the being alone,
away from my family, my
house and my home.
I can stand at my post through the rain and the sleet,
I can
sleep in a foxhole with little to eat.
I can carry the weight of killing
another,
or lay down my life with my sister and brother.
Who stand at the
front against any and all,
to ensure for all time that this flag will not fall."
"Go back inside," he said," and harbor no fright,
your family is waiting,
and I'll be all right."
"But isn't there something I can do, at the least,
"Give
you money," I asked, "or prepare you a feast?"
It seems all too little for all
that you've done,
for being away from your wife and your son."
Then his eye welled a tear that held no regret,
"Just tell us you love us,
and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we're gone,
to
stand your own watch, no matter how long.
For when we come home, either standing or dead,
to know you remember we
fought and we bled.
Is payment enough, and with that we will trust,
that we mattered to you as
you mattered to us.
Source: Unknown, but worth the read. Forwarded by: http://TroopsSuport.com