Grandpa

You sleep in your warm climate
Battle wounds have earned you these;
A little slice of home
on an alligator swamp.
The children visit when they can.
They come from a cold place
you haven't seen in years.
Change to you is moving mountains
but you've lived in many lands;
Waving good-bye to Little Boy,
holding out in bomb shelters.
Freedom from Depression
yet the horrors of the war
your grandchildren see everyday
raised by the black box of flashing lights.
These atomic babies don't grow
in your nuclear families
and the things that you have fought for
are not bedtime stories.
Still there are stories to tell,
but they look at you with haggard eyes
"Respect you elders" falls on dead ears.
Technology's offspring
that share your genes and blood
but they have misplaced your memoirs.
Who said history is written
by the winners of wars?
Or maybe all is lost.