Yes, I realize this is the Poets Corner...and while this story is grim...and you will wonder why I am putting up what appears to be a "war story"...and some may even get upset and immediately want to take me to task for posting this here... please bear with me and read this to the end.
Do that and you will understand why I chose to relate this here...

Also, I will not break protocol and go into details that would violate my oath.

I will tell you that this was the inspiration for my Post of "Dreams".
During the Vietnam War while on a joint mission with ARVN soldiers (South Vietnamese Military supposed-to-be "allies")...things took a turn for the worse. This "asset" my ARVN Captain counterpart insisted was reliable...turned out to be a North Vietnamese agent. Bad news. He walked us right into the meat grinder.
Things got hairy...and I noticed that our "asset" was gone...as was the Captain and several of his men.
You get the picture.
I called the mission broken, radioed it in...and called for pick-up at the river.
The ARVN soldiers took off...left us there. Enemy soldiers all over the place and they left us.
While scrambling through a twisting, boulder-filled ravine, we ran right into enemy soldiers. With the rocks and cliffs and being we were all mixed in together...gunfire was not a wise thing...and it went hand to hand combat.
I never saw the rifle butt coming that smashed into my right cheekbone and orbital, crushing the cheek and fracturing the orbital from cheek around the eye socket nearly to the middle of my forehead.
One moment I was on my feet fighting...the next, I was on my knees stunned and I knew I was hurt and that I had to get up...but I couldn't move for several seconds. I was absolutely helpless.
The enemy soldier stepped in to finish me...and my exec and best friend, Richard, stepped up behind him and shot the soldier through the spine with his .45.
The soldier went to his knees, then fell forward, twisting in midair and flopping onto his back right beside me.
And that was when I saw it.
When his torso hit the hard ground, a book slid from his breast pocket.
It was blue...and had embossed gold lettering on the cover. English. It was a book of poetry by Keats.
I was still young in years...but experience had tempered me...given me a cynicism that comes from being in war.
But this memory of a Communist Soldier, dedicated to killing the Imperialist Running Dogs of the decadent West... led to my writing "Dreams", posted here earlier.
Because I have wondered over the years if the dead soldier had been a teacher. Or maybe an educated small businessman...or farmer who just liked to read poetry...in English. Or....