with its pits of pain
where the dead and dying lay.
In the no man’s land
that separates friend from foe.
Hear the mournful sounds
of weeping flesh
entangled within the baptism of death.
Across the battlefield
where there are fleeting ghosts
of those who fell on another day.
One day the guns may fall silent
and flowers will once again dance
with an evening breeze.
Instead of the blood of innocence
milking the no man’s ground.
Birds may again sing one day
replacing the agony of young men
dying before their time.
In twenty, fifty or a hundred years
they will be remembered
for the sacrifice they gave,
condemning themselves to an early grave.
Maybe when that day comes
no more cannons will again roar
across the battlefield
with its pits of pain.
19 May 2009