So starts Canadian Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae’s famous poem, which features the poppies he saw on the battlefields of the Western Front.
In Flanders Fields was written on the battlefields around Ypres in Belgium, where the allies — including Australians — are still remembered every night with the sounding of The Last Post at the Menin Gate.
I have been fortunate enough to be at one of these services, with the sound of the bugle echoing around the Menin Gate, where the names of 55,000 servicemen, the location of whose graves in Belgium are unknown, are engraved.
Among them are the names of 6000 Australians.
The playing of The Last Post on the bugle that night was the most haunting rendition of it I had ever heard, and I still remember it clearly to this day.
And that was 20 years ago that I visited.
Earlier in the day I had done a tour of some of the battlefields and war cemeteries of the Ypres Salient.
Just to see the rows upon rows of white headstones in the war cemeteries is something you cannot forget in a hurry.
Some have names. But many are simply engraved with ‘an unknown soldier known unto God’.
We also visited the fields around where the war hospital used to be where Lt-Col McCrae wrote his poem.
There were still poppy fields in the area.
Today, the poppy is a symbol of commemoration of all those who fought and died in war.
They are sold in the lead-up to Remembrance Day.
And on the day itself, poppies adorn the lapels of many as a mark of respect.
While I have been to war commemoration services in places overseas such as Ypres, there are similar places in parts of Australia where those who died during the war are remembered.
There is a war cemetery at Adelaide River, where those who died during the 1942 bombing of Darwin and subsequent attacks by the Japanese are buried.
There are others in rural Queensland that I have visited, where there are graves of servicemen who were deployed to keep Australia safe during World War II.
Closer to home, you can see headstones marking war graves dotted throughout country cemeteries everywhere, marking deaths with respect, no matter what age they were when they died.
And on Remembrance Day, there are commemoration services throughout the country to remember those who fought and died in wars and peace-keeping missions.
It is worth thinking about wearing a poppy and getting along to one of these services on November 11.
And if you can’t make it to a service, it is still worth marking the day with one minute’s silence at 11am to remember all those who have fallen for their country.
10°C