(for my father and all his warrior-comrades)

In a field full of spring flowers
I hear a pause in the silent roar
of time as it rhymes its way
to the full stop that ends all
our lives. A hidden reverence
leaps across a rainbow into
my clouded sight, inverse night
falls away, sun appears in patches,
all is as it was before, crema four
in Auschwitz II-Birkenau.
Above, in the skies, Spitfires engage
Messerschmitts Bf 109 and Bf 110
in dog fights above the Sussex Downs.
It is a fight for life. The USA is neutral,
Britain is alone against the Nazi might. 
The USA makes Britain pay for food, arms
Lend-Lease began only in 41
after Pearl Harbour
after the Battle of Britain
after the loss of 544 British pilots,
which was about one in six of all the pilots
in RAF Fighter Command.
These gentle downland hills,
covered now with wild flowers,
attest to the enduring debt we owe
to these young men who freely
gave their life blood for our enduring freedom. 

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