What is the message of the poem Green Beret?

Well, you know because of the use of the Word "I" in the poem. When he says "and I do not know his name" in the second line, you know that "I" is the person who is talking. The parts where it says "he" and "the boy" and "the mercenaries" and "Green beret" ... those are third person. If it said "you," then it would be second person. These might help to sort out how you tell what perspective things are written from. It is easy once you get the hang of it, but I know it can be confusing at first: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_of_view_(literature) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_person Here is a link to the poem: http://www.caterina.net/paw/archives/000049.html