* "From the Beach to the Reservoir" *

Verse 2 from the poem

"From the Beach to the Reservoir"

Out on patrol with twenty- one men

Don't know if we'll be back or when

Watch out look to the right

I just caught a flicker of movement in the moonlight

Hit the deck hit the deck as fast as you can

Come on Marines I don't want to lose another man

Come on guys keep your eyes peeled what do you see

There he is at two o'clock who's got the Springfield O-3

Squeeze that round off he's all yours

Breath slowly remember we can't afford Maggies drawers

On my motion move forward please keep low

That's it keep your heads down move low and slow

Intelligence reports there are gooks up ahead

Heads down look sharp I don't need any more dead

Up ahead there's a house off to the right

You can just make it out in the morning light

You take the right flank I'll move straight ahead

Look sharply men remember what intelligence said

Keep down keep down that's a rifle I see

I'm going to recon ahead keep your eyes on me

There off to the left in that clump of trees

Looks like a platoon of gooks grouped in threes

They're heading for that house over by that ditch

I wonder if I should take out that last son of a bitch

Lifting my arm pumping one two three

Bringing my men up grouping them next to me

Letting my men see what I had found

Telling them to be careful to hug the ground

Firing off a round from a three point five

Crawling forward to see if anyone is alive

There at that window they're firing back

Jesus Christ they got our radioman in the back

Open fire men blow those bastards to hell

Corpsman corpsman I hear a marine yell

The firing is so loud it sounds like the fourth of July

Then there's an explosion as fire lights up the sky

Checking my men to see who's dead or alive

Eight men are wounded My God I've lost five

As much as I want to I just can't cry

All I can say is SEMPER FI