"A Sailor's Prayer" = A Family's Love, July 4

This was written by Joseph Anthony Welteroth, U.S. Navy, Winter 1945, Pacific Ocean (Iwo Jima?).  He wrote it to his wife in Pennsylvania in 1945.  It appeared in full page ads in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and other newspapers across the United States on July 4, 2012.  It was placed by the four sons of the parents and it had to cost at least $250,000.00.  Quite a tribute:



Here's the ad:





And here's the text again:

“A Sailor’s Prayer”

“We will not go gently into this dark night.  For the love we carry will guide the light.  And hold our tears ’til the morning’s bright.  Awakened again into the night, We will not go gently into this dark night.  The day surrounds us without its light, And silence falls, come soon the night.  Where shadows cast past fire’s light, we will not go gently into this dark night.  The paths before us, the dark, the light.  We ask for nothing, we know what’s right.  The truth, the glory, it’s found its fight.  Our strength, our courage, our guiding light.  We will not go gently into this dark night, And give our life without the right to call the sun into the night, and question the question, what’s wrong, what’s right.  We will not go gently into this dark night.  For the love we share will guide the light, And pray someday you find what’s right?  We pray someday you find the light.  We will not go gently into this great night.  The paths before us, the dark, the light.  Tomorrow comes and so the fight.  Where Heroes fall but still we fight.  Their voices call into the night.  This war won’t end, no end in sight.  We ask for nothing, we fight this fight.  We ask for nothing, we know what’s right.  We ask for nothing.  We found the light.”

Joseph Anthony Welteroth, U.S. Navy