From the book's jacket:

"The stories in this book, gathered from Hampton Roads [Virginia] veterans of World War II and the Korean War, capture the terrors of deadly warfare and the courage of those who fought for America and her allies. Whether a sailor fighting flames on his ship after a kamikaze attack or a nurse dressing wounds during the London Blitz, the veterans featured here revisit a past that lives on. Mere kids when they joined, as their pictures attest, they gave the strength of youth for a chance to serve their country and see the world. Those of us who haven't been in a war will gain insight into what it means to lose comrades in batle or to suffer bodily pains caused by the wounds of war. Those who have served in the military will see themselves in the sacred glances. It is our hope that this book will bridge the gap of generations and honor the sacrifices of our neighbors, our heroes."


Sacred Glances

by Suzanne Rhodes

One by one, they take their seats before the young,
spreading out snapshots of the smooth-jawed khaki boys
they were back then, with the Browning automatic
slung over a shoulder, or in sailor suits
piled around their Bofors guns, grinning.
Some bring souvenirs--a red Japanese flag, a leaflet
dropped over Korea, the yearbook of a ship that later sank
with all its fresh-faced crew.

They've lived their second, ever-settling lives
for a long time and move about the ordinary fixtures of the world
on unsteady legs, but now and then they see a flash of faces
never coming home--the reason for the interviews
being to dredge the sea or comb the fields for sacred glances

as if the young could understand that wars must be
and men must die, or grasp that Myers or Clark,
mere kids like these, cocky, the best of pals,
would wind up choking under flaming beams
or writhing legless on a frozen hill--

when just the day before they’d mocked
and horseplayed, sucked on cigarettes, bragged of girls--
What words can match such weight: the heavy, daily sound
of bodies sliding off gurneys into the churning waves,
the stink of ovens stuffed with the starved.
One by one they try their best to tell it,
to kids whose faces mirror what they were.