Remembering June

20 years ago, 4th of June: Tiananmen Square Incident
65 years ago, 6th of June: D-Day

The Kranji War Cemetery yesterday at sunset was a enclave of serenity, peace, and hope.

I felt it fitting to reproduce here a poem that my sis wrote when she was in the fifth grade, after a visit with her school to the memorial:

In this peaceful scene before me,
white graves as far as one can see.
There’s a sense of great respect and honour
for the brave people who died in valour.

These men did not die in vain,
or sorrow, or sadness, or anguish, or pain.
Instead, these soldiers were one great gift;
War and violence from us did they lift.

They had courage and they were skilled,
hardly regretting the fight as they were killed.
Brutalness, torture and death they braved.
They fought merely for us to be saved.

For themselves and their lives they did not care;
they wanted to fight in the war, the dare.
Though with their lives they had to pay,
now gone from the earth in which they lay.

They know they definitely did the right thing.
In the wind you can hear their spirits sing:
Do not mourn for us in grief and sorrow;
we passed on for a brighter tomorrow.

We did what we had to do.
It was the only thing that we knew we could.
We removed the confinement, the several large boulders.
We did what we did, for we are soldiers.