The supermarket rings with noise, people talking, children screaming, people on phones asking querulous questions.

music in the background pumping out tunes from the sixties and seventies, I know those tunes, I sing the words

Silence, hush, quiet

everything stops, no-one speaks or moves, no music. and suddenly I feel sad, I remember

I think of all the men and women who have suffered and died in wars, and all the men and women who have returned home in severe mental and physical distress

I reflect on the brutality of war and the futile waste

I imagine if my children or my grandchildren were at war and I feel tearful

I gaze around the supermarket, people standing still, wiping their eyes

we listen to the Last Post, poignant and moving, together in reflective pose

Then the supermarket rings with noise, people talking, children screaming, people on phones asking querulous questions.

music in the background pumping out tunes from the sixties and seventies, I know those tunes.

Lest we forget