The story "The Things They Carried," by Tim O'Brien, is a story about a of handful of young and naive soldiers who face trying times during the Vietnam war. He characterizes each of the men by the things that they physically carried rather than elaborating on their various personalities individually. Cross, the Lieutenant, who plays a major role in leading his team members faces the largest burden of them all when he blames himself for a fallen soldier due to his fantasy of a woman whom he was once with. From the poem "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfred Owen the narrator describes his journey and reflects on the terrifying images of his comrade's death. The narrator gives an unbiased but graphic story of his experience at war. Furthermore, the poem, "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner" by Randall Jarrell the narrator elaborates on a specific attribute of war style where the soldier stays in a ball turret that is completely visible by the enemy. This is seen as a suicidal position because even though it is meant to be used to kill enemies from above, you are in plain sight and unprotected from their fire. "The Things They Carried," "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner" and "Dulce et Decorum Es,t" all posses their own experiences but are comparable to each other in ethics and nobility. The poem "Dulce et Decorum Est" reveals a story in which a comrade has fallen victim to death in a war where his alliance is powerless in the situation to provide a source of help to him. This references back to the story "The Things They Carried" because it incorporates a similar scenario. As O'Brien states, "He carried a strobe of light and the responsibility of the lives of his men" this evidently portrays the obligation and burden Cross resembled to the troop. Cross, the Lieutenant blatantly grieves over the death of his comrade and angrily blames himself for the misfortune even though their was nothing he could of physically done to protect Lavender.