COMMEMORATION: Kegan Z. Mahon of Port Allegany shared this poem he wrote Wednesday, the day of the 75th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. Kegan graduated from the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford with a bachelor of arts degree in English literature.

THE CHILDREN OF MODERNITY

(A Commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor)

Here we stand, the children of modernity,

And we hold the promise of tomorrow in our hands.

We dedicate to the people of Eternity,

Remembrances of wars with foreign lands.

Time has passed, as time is ever-fleeting,

Things are not now as they once had been.

Day by day, brave hearts shall cease their beating,

As the march of footsore soldiers comes to end.

Voices stilled in death upon blue waters,

Fiery scenes of hell beneath God’s sun,

With few left to tell the tale, save sons and daughters —

The children of the souls of ’41.

Forevermore, we pray for their salvation;

Pray that the solace of their rest is long and sweet,

With remembrances of times when, as a Nation,

We stood as one, and never called “Retreat!”

Here we stand, the children of modernity,

We hold the promise of tomorrow in our hands.

One day, we too shall greet Eternity,

With a reverence they know we’ll understand.