The Western Front

They said it would be exhilarating,

They said we'd be unstoppable,
They said it would be “a walk in the park.”
That we would be home, before Christmas.

Little did we know that those were but guesses and lies.
We never thought that we'd be stuck in trenches,
Where our bodies would be slowly rotting away,
That our battles would have no victorious ending.

They never said that I’d have to leave my friends.

Leave my friends for dead, or worse yet;
To have to watch them painfully slip away,
Unable to do anything,
Aside from ending their misery,

From the misery of the trench,

The trench with the stench of death,
That horrid stench,
Which came from this accursed mud,
Mud littered with shattered dreams and splattered blood,
Was as pungent as the smell of the gunpowder,
That lofted through the morning air.

We lived and died in this.

This crack of death and disease;
Was but the start of our problems.
Only a few yards away,
Laid the opposition,
Eager to unite us with our fallen friends,
We were ready to return the favor.

With guns mounted all around,

We readied our attack,
Occasionally,
Our opponent would launch large shells,
Though they were useless,
As most did nothing more
than punch into the earth.

So we just prepared ourselves,

We prepared for the invasion to come,
For our unwelcome guests to arrive,
To greet them with our rifles,
And invite them to trip over our barbed wire,
But just like bad memories,
They kept on through.

They kept trying and dying.

And today we returned the favor.
Our blind and misguided Generals,
Forced us out onto high ground,
Ordering, “Over the top men!”
We listened and obeyed.

So we traversed the land where no-man belongs,

And ran past our fallen comrades.
A grim reminder of attacks failed and lives lost,
Just to be welcomed by our former guests.
Who graciously set up traps for us,
And took many into an eternal rest.
But, this wouldn’t be my fate.
A hidden mine decided to take my leg from my body.

So, here I lay

Waiting to depart,
I’m ready to go.
Hoping that I’ve done what’s right.
Here, laying beside me,
My friends,
More fortunate than I,
With many bullet holes,
All placed evenly across their chests and heads,
With the last bit of life’s essence pouring out.
Out onto the ground,
To pool where they lay.
Mixed with friend and foe alike.
They left with only moans,
But I will join them soon,
And leave all my worries behind me,
In this muddy and bloody crater.

Do not forget me,

Nor what my friends and I did,
Don’t let a horrible war like this,
Ever happen again.
To ever take the lives of those,
Whom we’ve fought and died for.
"Lest ye forget."