Day Tripping The Trenches

 

His hard, dry, muddy surface broke

to crack a savage smile

as he leaned upon his rifle

like a watchman at the gates.

Then he pointed down a greensward line

of duckboard pavee'd trench.

Cocked an ear to hear

the laughter of his mates.

 

As I moved along the covert path,

the verdant verdure died;

and whistling finch

gave way to screaming shell.

Thus 'Keep the Home Fires Burning'

turned to 'Burn Baby Burn'.

Leaving Heaven's Door

become The Gates of Hell.

 

So I huddled in a muddle,

with a puddle at my feet.

Felt the ancient god of battles

kiss my brow.

Fought a sudden urge to purge myself,

just kept my insides in,

crying 'mother hold me

in your safe arms now.'

 

This was meant to be a field trip.

Added colour to my book.

Not an exercise in Nemesis

for boys.

Yet malevolence and violence

kill the obsequies of silence.

Throwing earth

in awful shovelfuls of noise.

 

Surging round a sandbagged corner,

I ran into men I knew.

My creations, out of figment,

birthed for death.

So well-written, now hard-bitten

faced the beast and stood the test.

Looking old my slaughtered children,

faint corruption on their breath.

 

The enigma was the stigma.

Each man carried one the same.

Neath their battledress

there hung a loop of bowel.

Tripes that fall from youthful stomachs

sliding over bayonet blades.

Kneeling deep in blood and water

I lift up my head and howl.

 

Running mad from my creations

My young host, his pose a picture,

used to sell a news

That's so far from the truth,

stood there waiting smile intact.

Same stigmata, bowel splatter,

mud-stained, blood-drained, tattered martyr;

emblematic of our murdered golden youth.