The USS Bray

‘Twas a ship called the USS Bray Named after a fellow named Ray. Leon was his middle name; Don’t know that he had much fame. Sponsored by a wife named Mattie Sunk as a target in sixty-three, Yeah a ship in the US Navy. Raymond Leon was born in eighteen A Texan from the town of Greenville, Made it all the way to corporal and Went to war against those Japanese. Got pinned down and no way to please; He had to fight those Japs hand to hand, And so he did but died by a grenade; Indeed a hero of him they made. ‘Twas, as they say, a great loss, But that dead man got the Navy Cross. Killed in August of forty-two, But to him the Navy was true; They launched that ship in forty-four For the world to honor and adore, And for mother, Mattie, it was a door To find rest for the loss of her boy Who had brought her love and joy.

A.m. on 9 June, 2021