No one could say why they were there the brigades the battalions and some in neat formed lines in neat clean uniforms they had come they marched on the parade grounds and through the big cities they trained in the fields out front of towns they ran through the wires to get to their goals they fell to the mud all mown down and their neat uniforms were ragged and torn their clean faces running with blood the muck of the battlefield filled their boots and their minds their assault waves were a simple flood the pretending of training faded from view as their numbers fell to the few the bulllets and shrapnel stopped forward forays as they scrambled to avoid injury or death every day as they cried and they died under the sun until there were none
The lips are thin their colour grey the hair is dull and lank the skin is pallid tugor at bay the smell is fetid, rank the wound is swollen putrid, reddened exposed are tissue and bone what man lies here dead and neglected? what inspired him to roam?
the war that left him lying here alone on hardened ground did abandon him as all wars will to his silence amongst the furious sound
what home did he leave? what cause was his? that left him so cold and pale so far from where he began so distant from a family’s wail with no one to grieve his lost soul with none to respectfully lay him deep
we will take him to yet another hole we will bury him amongst the others in yet another heap
Poetry days #15.
All work is my own and subject to copyright. I do not use AI. I do not want AI to use my work.
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