Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Lest we forget...


Image credit

3 comments:

  1. great pic, where did you get it?

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  2. Photo credit is under the pic, to the left, just run your mouse over it and click. This will take you to the original.

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  3. Flashing lights and no sirens, all emergencies over
    The motorcade passes, with the heroes who fell
    And all on the streets stop, and in silence bear witness
    Such sorrow and thanks, no mere words can tell


    Who ever can forget the gray ash covered engines
    coming back from the alarm like no other before
    Such pain for survivors, to embrace all the families
    Of comrades so loved, now on that distant shore


    Chief Downey, Father Mike, First Deputy Feehan
    Peter Ganci and many too many to tell
    Your memories we’ll honor we n'er will forget you
    You brought hope to the horror when the two towers fell.


    Remember Tim Stackpole, how he prayed in the wreckage
    In that terrible fire that took two of his friends
    So horribly injured he fought to recover
    To return to his ladder and to die with his men


    So now to acknowledge, just one of the many
    Engine 33 ladder company 9
    There’s 10 empty places around their table
    10 fallen brothers who fell on the line


    Remember Kevin Pfiefer, Mike Boyle and Keith Maynard
    Jeff Walz, Brian Bilcher, Robert King Dave Arce
    Gerarde Baptiste, Robert Evans, John Tierney,
    10 lost out of 40 from one company


    And though we mourn them, they’re still on the job now
    Though they have fallen, they’re still standing tall
    Their spirit will bolster their sisters and brothers
    Their unseen presence will answer each call



    So tell all your children to tell all their children
    never pass a firehouse without a brief pause
    And thank all the heroes who work on those engines
    Each day they risk all in humanity’s cause



    I wrote this the week after 9\11... after a fiddler and I spent some time in the firehouse, playing for the company, as they sat resting after a day of working on the pile. Genie and I have spent every 09\11 thereafter with the folks of Engine 33 Ladder 9. Retired firefighters, family, the neighbors get together and remember together.

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