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What Did I Fight For? (poem)

By Bruce H. Hendrickson

A year in Vietnam, among active four
Hot dusty or muddy, the four seasons tour
With luck I came back, but others did not
Their names on a wall, to not be forgot

Told it's for freedom in lies strong and bold
Equality for everyone the bill of goods sold.
But t'was for the rich who owned Companies
With profiteers' pitches full of bold-faced lies

What did I fight for those long years ago?
For the rich not for freedom I now know.
We must all act now to free our country
From an evil and perverse plutocracy

Forward we go thirty years and more
To more Asian wars for freedom they swore
The Intel was cooked, to bolster their lies
E-mails deleted, kept from public eyes
Fifteen years more and an end to progress
Tsar in the White House, brown shirts in Congress
Our values betrayed, the setting for war
I must not forget. What did I fight for?

I thought 'twas freedom to keep us all free
But 'twas corporatism so the rich make money
It's the working class with boots on the ground
Whose blood pays for war not the rich, I found

What did I fight for those long years ago?
For the rich not for freedom I now know.
We must all act now to free our country
From an evil and perverse plutocracy

And to honor those who here they are not
Their names on a wall, to not be forgot

— Bruce H. Hendrickson