Amazing Grace

"The haunting wail of bagpipes is drifting over our corner of Camp Ramadi. Bravo company's amateur pipist is slowly pacing while he practices a song none of us want to hear. The tune he plays is Amazing Grace. Tomorrow morning he will play it at the memorial service for CPL Shannon, the first member of our task force to die here in Iraq. He fell to an unlucky hit from one of the improvised bombs that litter the roads. He was from another company- one of the few from that group that I've spoken with. I didn't know him well, but I'm proud to say I knew him. I wrote a poem in his memory that I didn't plan to post, but one of his friends asked me to."
Acute Politics