Grandpa was drafted to ‘Nam in 1969,
He maintained that what he saw was akin to hell.
His life forever changed on the governments assign,
But I’ll share a story he could bring himself to tell.
His company was resting near a bubbling stream,
Fighting off the strange amount of bugs.
Clear and beautiful, the flowing water gleamed,
As they took time to fill up their jugs.
By then they were too exhausted to think,
They didn’t have energy to scout around.
All were parched and yearned for a drink,
The wind blew upstream while the water, down.
Later, they found a buffalo’s corpse -
It lay there, rotting right beyond the bend.
Their path took them there after, in due course,
‘I swear I didn’t retch’ grandpa would defend.
The moral of this story is when you drink of the water
Always remember the source,
But don’t forget to mind that by its journey it’s been altered -
And often not for the better, I remorse.
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