Cant vote wont vote

 I wont be voting Mr politician
Because I've got no fixed abode
Once a proud British soldier
Now I walk a lonely road
I swapped the medals on my chest
For a blanket and some food
I no longer guard the Queen
She will not think I'm rude
I don’t have a TV set
Politicians I despise
My own film is in my head
I can still hear those men’s cries
Of comrades long gone now
They will be with me to the end
We once made a vow
This Country we would defend
Some say that not to vote
Would be an awful shame
Be we veterans no the truth
Your all the bloody same.

© Tony McNally

Before you discard me

NOT EVERYONE HAS A MERRY CHRISTMAS

As you know now and again Soldiers off the Street   come across something on the net that gets to us, here is one we found today that we can relate to, as we have come across very similar stories from people living on the streets.
We have a lot of people in this group that work with the homeless and we are sure they will agree this made up story is very close to fact for many homeless people!!

As always we recommend you to have your tissues at the ready!!

The Broken Man
By Alan Forrest Smith | December 6th, 2012

A letter from a son to a mother.
The son is the broken man.

Dear mother

I hope you are well yet I am broken man.
Here I am today, right now, cold, and sore and sleep deprived walking along a wet empty street. It’s filled with people out shopping, smiling, laughing and doing all the things all people do at Christmas but for me empty of soul for my life.
I’m broken, snapped in two, torn apart and so so sad for life. I know I shouldn’t be but today I am stuck, trapped into a corner yet despite my endless pacing today I am truly broken.
My lover has gone, my father has gone, I have no home to boast, no friends to friend with, no compassion to receive, no love to embrace, no nothing for nothing.
Mother has life cheated me or did I cheat life? What took place was a moment that led me into darkens yet I know beyond darkness there can be light. Where is my light, where is the shine for my heart.
Oh my darling woman I wish you were the eyes that were to read this page. I adored and loved you until I could pour no more. I hurt you, my love has left me I am a broken man.
Mother I need to be held like you held me when I was a child.
Mother I need to be read to like you read to me in my small bed.
Mother I need to be encouraged and cheered on so this race I can complete.
I’ve just seen Father Christmas on the main street. The children were cheering, singing, waving, laughing and I could see in the small eyes the joy of Christmas eve and the thoughts of waking mum and dad up on Christmas day before daylight wanting to go and see if Santa had been.
Mother can you remember doing that with me your small, innocent boy? Me and my brother would run through at 3am, 4am, 5am, 6am and keep running through until we got both of you out of bed and downstairs. Can you remember the look on our faces as the old lounge door creaked open to reveal presents from Santa yet we would rush over to our old brick fireplace to see if Santa had eaten his shortbread and taken the carrot for his reindeer?
As I walk along this freezing cold street, my tears freeze as they run down into my unshaven face. I am filthy, I am broke, I am ripped in two by life itself. The drink, the drugs, the wasted opportunity has brought me to this point. My Christmas dinner if it exists will be scraps from the city trashcans. I do have a food secret on the street. The guy in Starbucks seems to have taken a liken to me and if I am outside on closing he always brings me a sandwich, hot coffee and a cake. Maybe the next one will be turkey, cranberry and stuffing.
Mother I miss you, I am so sorry for the pain I have caused you and my father and my family and my darling woman over the years. I do wonder how is she, do you see her?
I know you were all patient with me, so patient with me yet by destruction has set its course and refused to let go of me. I am so sad, I am so broken, I am so lost lost lost and shattered, barely, hardly human anymore. My life is about surviving; the joys of my life have long gone.
Tonight my bed will be where I stop. I have no bedding, no mattress, no anything. I will be abused, spat on, kicked and beaten. In a finer moment someone will take pity on me, they will look at my humanity not my insanity and make some kind of offering to me. If I am lucky I might have a conversation and be on the receiving end of kind words.
My mind goes back to the days of wine, laughter and good food. How I would love to taste your dinners just once more, How I would love to drink the drink of kings around the big table just once more. How I would give anything to feel the flesh of my lover against my skin just one final time. My days have come mother, they have come.
Mother I miss you so much, this world has ruined many lives yet I am the ruin of my own. I know your heartbreak for your boy is greater than my loss and I also know your heartbreak came from my actions.
Tonight I want to die. Tonight I want it all to end yet my greatest fear is tomorrow arrives and the day repeats itself.
So mother I know its Christmas and I hope you can read this scribble on the back of this old piece of cardboard. I have no money to pay for a card and no money to pay for paper.
I’m sorry I mailed it through in the night also. I couldn’t allow you to see me like this. I know you’d be shocked and as broken as me to cast your eyes upon the son you birthed just over 26 years ago. I look like I sound I am old for my years and beaten to a pulp.
Mother please doesn’t cry now. Today is my last day on earth. I have done and I have given up. I have tried and I have lost. The darker side of life has over run me; the worst part of mankind has devoured me, chewed me up and spat me out. Tonight I shall sleep for the very last time.
Christmas in a life like this is too painful. I can’t face another Christmas like this. I cant live another winter like this. I can’t bear another moment in my body like this.
I am so sorry mother, you are wonderful, kind and you are my love. Tell my father I adored him and tell my brother I loved being his brother. It started well and hasn’t ended so well yet life handed me an experience to be experienced but sadly I took the wrong ones. Forgive me mother and pray if there is a God he will also forgive me waste.

I love all of you.
I am beat.
I am done.
I am a broken man.

Support Our Armed Services

Cameron’s Boxes For The Boys Initiative

Hot on the heals of Prime Minster Cameron’s new initiative Homes For Heroes he has been quick to defend his treatment of military personnel leaving the forces and finding themselves homeless. This is a press release he gave this morning whilst taking a photo opportunity of mowing the Wimbledon Tennis courts.


As you all know I take great pride in the sacrifice our young men and woman make in the defence of our Nation and I feel its only right and proper that they get priority treatment when it comes to housing issues. Only a few days after I launched the HFH initiative I was shark fishing off the coast of South Africa and I dropped my Ray Bans into the water I new that I had to do more. Once again I had a simple wizard idea to help our Heroes. I have decided and I will make sure that it is made law in the new Military Covenants that any serviceman or woman that leaves HM armed Forces will be issued with a flat packed cardboard box. This will enable them to have somewhere to sleep as soon as they arrive back in the UK. I have spoken to the police Forces around Britain and once all cardboard boxes are clearly marked with the Veteran sticker they will not be harassed for being homeless. And that’s not all Ladies & Gentlemen , at great extra cost to the British tax payer I am throwing in a tin of water prove spray so our veterans can also be comfortable warm and dry when they come home. Due to our huge deficit and ring fencing of overseas aid and the hundreds of millions cost of my War in Libya it will be twelve months until the first cardboard boxes start to arrive at the MOD from a kind donator who happens to know a thing or two about computers, shall we call him Bill? That’s all I have to say on this matter for now but I can assure you next time I’m Grouse shooting I will be thinking of yet more initiatives for our brave boys and gals. I have to go now as I am due at the Indian Embassy to give the Indian Ambassador a huge cheque for Five Hundred Million for a new Nuclear state of the art Aircraft Carrier, which I’m sure you will all agree is money well spent, 


Thank You.


Dave.






Not that far away from the truth is it?

A tribute from all of us at Soldiers Off The Street to Les an ex Para.

Your work is now done soldier lay down your head and rest free from suffering RIP.


Ex-servicemen make up a quarter of homeless people in Britain, according to Shelter and the government's social exclusion unit.

HOMELESS VETERANS TO BE BRANDED CRIMINALS

Next they will want  to execute  homeless people ? 




Link

Forgotten Heroes

On Television last night Panorama Forgotten Heroes  we once again revisit an age old problem with soldiers making that huge transition from the Armed Forces to civilian street, slightly easier to make in peace time but a massive leap into mainstream life when young men and woman have been personally involved in the blood and spilled intestines of modern Warfare. I felt terrible sad and tearful watching that programme because I saw myself in some of those young men who’s lives have been destroyed as well as friends that are no longer with us who succumbed to PTSD not on the battlefield but alone on the streets of Britain. I’m not going to give you a big list of statistics, prison population, suicides, ect, that information is out there and I have on this Blog wrote it down many times. I felt like I was watching a Greek tragedy, that just keeps on repeating its self. From the Crimea to the Falklands to Afghanistan you can bet your life that its Tommy that will suffer. If you are an ex member of the Armed Forces who made it through your service physically and mentally unscathed spare a thought for those who never. You could even pop down to your nearest homeless shelter and see if there are any veterans that you could help? You don’t have to give any money just a friendly smile and a chat to someone you don’t know but who you share a common bond of serving your Country together. I’m not naïve and I know that nearly all politicians pay lip service to this problem. The great British public (God Bless Them ) will keep on putting there loose change in the Poppy tins and Help For Heroes collections and the politicians will sit back and let our brave man and woman be cared for by Charity. You can call me Racist if you want I don’t care anymore I’m far to tired and ill for that to bother me, but it is plainly wrong that an Asylum seeker can come to this Country and be given houses cash and all the benefits and an ex soldier just back from Afghanistan is pushed to the bottom of society, this kind of despicable treatment can only bread hatred and resentment. I wonder when the next of these programmes will be made?  One things for sure War is not going away and they way our Country is heading there will be plenty of empty shop doorways for our Heroes to try and get a nights sleep. Lets be honest Great Britain never has been and never will be a Land Fit For Heroes.

`What should we do with the drunken soldier?

Christopher Alder, 37, a former paratrooper and Falklands War veteran, died on the floor of the custody suite at Hull's Queens Gardens police headquarters in April, 1998 after being arrested. He choked to death on blood and vomit resulting from injuries he had sustained in the earlier fracas while officers ignored him and carried on chatting.

ALONE

A poem about a homeless soldier on the streets of the UK

“Forget-Me-Not " Founded by servicemen for Servicemen

I was asked if I would like to write a piece for the Charity “Forget-Me-Not "  in support of homeless veterans many of which suffer with PTSD, a combination that I an truly amazed that someone could cope with, however the human spirit and determination of servicemen to overcome adversity is truly awe inspiring. You can read what I wrote “Here"