#1577 - never forget

 

1577

5.116

25.iv.24

never forget

in a slouch hat, sing

 

the young still falling

many unarmed

 

let it not be namelessly

 

by bayonet or bullet

give as good as get

 

falling for the lies of war

 

lung of that gas

 

a drowning when the ship goes down

 

falling for the old men’s lies

 

and every ghost to wonder yet

now beery in the after march

what if I’d survived

 

and if there were no uniform

and if they hadn’t served

 

where now?

the tyrant scowl

 

we’d all be speaking gibberish

 

gone under those who won’t grow old

let them not be nameless

 

never forget

the many from almost death come home

 

remember their remembering

what they saw

how they know

 

keep the fear, the trauma, on

 

fists of it, call home th scars

 

the fuzzy wuzzy track

and saintly

 

say brave to be ourselves

 

these are stories that we tell

 

how long till stone gives up a name?

 

we bury them again, again

 

and there’s our money now

 

coin up in the air

who knows?

 

cross field, disarm a mine

 

here are several silences

 

then where’s the war

to keep us safe?

 

never forget it was the men

followed the orders

into their fire

 

stumbled on

and rose again

 

trench the blood

ghosts come

to end all wars

 

we bow

 

and the young

the young are still falling

 

adrift in such a love

 

out of this world into none