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War

Above all
the last
was hope,

clinging like breath:

the newborn calf
the old centurion
across the divide
where elephants hide

but broken dishes with untold
secrets
and tarnished silverware
are never lost only misguided;
and teeth are never stained
in Hollywood smiles
where Dior gowns
and Emerald City sparkle
on someone else's neck
where bruised lips are not
weapons and men do not
count the hours
and women do not, do not
carry dying children into the land
of forgetfulness

where blood and sand poison
even the deepest well.

Last few words: 
Today is Veteran's Day in the USA. At another poetry site, Obi (he posts here on occasion) added a memorial from the Uk which I'll post beneath my poem.
Editing stage: 

Comments

Obadiah Grey:

Here in Blighty we have just had "Remembrance Sunday", a day on which we remember the fallen.

This is a quote from the last survivor from WW1,,, Now deceased.
"When the war ended,
I don't know if I was more relieved that we'd won or that I didn't have to go back.
Passchendaele was a disastrous battle!“
thousands and thousands of young lives were lost.
It makes me angry.
Earlier this year, I went back to Ypres to shake the hand of Herr Kuentz,
Germany's only surviving veteran from the war. It was emotional.
He is 107. We've had 87 years to think what war is.
To me, it's a licence to go out and murder.
Why should the British government call me up and take me out to a battlefield to shoot a man I never knew,
whose language I couldn't speak?
All those lives lost for a war finished over a table.
Now what is the sense in that?"

- Harry Patch.

author comment

Five of them..I had the photos in uniform
at home..my grandmother the only sister
big family..large name..They are buried
in Rosedale Toronto a wealthy old name
cemetary full of trees and age..

and all five came back..an amazing feat
a miracle....
I read many books on that war
and had shell shock survivors
in our family from the second
saw the vietnam kids during my childhood
arriving with plates in their heads
from riverboat mine explosions the captian
long haired beared wild eyed
and violent..looked like curt cobain
all of twenty three

and the world war two vets
didnt talk about it but had nightmares
till the day they passed
nicest people
whom saw the horrors upon horrors

and the children I met
whom were survivors of the camps
all grown up
and the bombed city kids
whom remember the bombs
landing
watching their neighbours
vanish in a crater
thinking they were safe
bombs dont land same spot
twice.

War is messed
its just for profiteers
selling tools
and factories
oroducing weapons
and the populace
sending kids

its never gonna stop

and war
is
hell

thank you

If only the worlds money men were ignored by presidents and prime ministers, and polititions all over this world listened to the people who put them in power. But we're brainwashed by telivision and the like, that there is some sort of glory in battles. But as Harry states it's just licensed murder. Nice poem with the alternative view on war. Good to read something from you again , Love Roscoe...

Roscoe Llane,

Religion will rip your faith off, and return
for the mask of disbelief that's left.

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