Sacrifice

by Barry Bright
FreeKentucky.com

Hail ye there
Children of Liberty
Have ye forgotten so soon,
Pioneer prints in bloodied mud
Mule-pulled plows turning dusty sod
On ridgesides too rough for modern tools
Families trusting all possessions in prairie schooners
Casting off all to the mountain in quest of another side
Those who prayed and played and fought and sacrificed childhood
So we can take for granted what they only dreamed their heirs might know
A God who opened a continent, a promised land, with his Word and pioneer faith
Missionaries of Christian civilization, who brought both terror and eternal salvation
What it means to leave all one knows, with no hope of hearing from home ever again
To be tossed across ocean and pursued through forest by savages, both heathen and "civilized"
Brothers against brothers, how for the want of understanding both sides were deceived by suited liars
Hails of steel, fire and lead permeating air, the last breathed by grown children of those who would be free.

Common Law Copyright 1998, by Barry Bright

"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

--John Stuart Mill