Lest we Forget

Lest we Forget

A quarter of a million underage young British soldiers

Fought in World War One.

Each one, one in a million – each one gone.

Journalists arrested or outlawed at the front,

Threatened with execution

For publishing unpatriotic pollution.

Over a quarter of a million women working on the land,

An army in the landscape.

Each one, one in a million – a new role taking shape.

Nurses arrested and executed saving other’s lives.

Medicine in its early days,

Moving into another phase.

A million horses sent over to the trenches,

Mules and dogs on guard.

Each one, one in a million – a life that is scarred.

Objectors, pacifists, those with different views.

Too old, too young, or simply disinclined -

Labelled by society - some heroes, some maligned.

Disabled, grannies or mothers waiting for the news,

Scientists and engineers expanding knowledge and the mind,

Shop-keepers, farmers, all those who were left behind.

Over 37 million casualties – civilian or in uniform -

Statistics are unclear.

Each one, one in a million – but each one someone dear.

And dear the cost to one and all

Will we ever the lesson learn?

Do not forget them, one and all

For each is our concern.

 By Linda Prince

© Charmaine Harrison @ http://charmingphotography.weebly.com/

 

 

 

 

November the 11th at 11am

November the 11^th at 11am

Hostilities will halt but they fought right to the end.

I lost a young soldier, a lover and a friend.

As I stand in the field and survey the watery golden sun

I wait and watch the landscape, a battle fought and won.

There’s an eerie silence, expectant and hushed

That rings in my ears, the foe it is crushed.

The breeze ripples by and is turning

To a murmur of cheering, longing and yearning.

The hands on the watch reach eleven exact

And the signatured agreement becomes an act.

Battles stop and the guns now cease,

Emotions and tears, not bullets release,

And there is peace.

By Linda Prince 


 

Nurse

Nurse

Unaccustomed as I am to hospitals, I’m sure I can help the effort.

Unaccustomed as I am to workers, I know that I won’t be caught short.

I mean how hard can it be?

Unaccustomed as I am to hardship, I can put up with a roughing it a tad

Unaccustomed as I am to foreign lands, of course it’s not a fad.

I mean what is there to see?

One has to support the war effort

So I’ll serve King and Country as a VAD

As a field nurse helping young men,

Walking wounded, shelled shocked and sad.

I’ve had three months training and I’m ready for the trench

Though I haven’t seen a dead body as it rots within sickening stench.

But they tell me I am ready and I’m cut out for battle nursing

And I volunteered, so there’s no reversing.

I mean - how hard can it be?

By Linda Prince

Rose, my Rose

Rose, my Rose

Christmas Eve, nineteen seventeen,

I think of my Rose, just seventeen.

The tenor croons, the first little song of love.

In Picardy roses are blooming.

In Piccadilly my Rose is blooming.

The tenor swoons and our roads may be far apart.

Enlisting for France the Tommy singing,

In Petty France baby Tommy is singing,

Lambert Murphy on record in my heart.

Rose humming our song full of memories and bygones

Rose, my Rose remembering our love that is gone by

The song is the last little song she hears.

By Linda Prince

Grandad abroad

Grandad abroad

From Tonbridge to Bombay,

From Quetta to Afghanistan

Grandad had his day.

Another brave young boy

Who fought for God and King.

Another one to deploy.

But Grandad was a fighter,

In grim conditions battled,

But with moments that were lighter.

We cannot pain measure

As he fought for his life abroad,

But we remember him with pleasure.

For the family will always say,

‘Do you remember what Grandad did

That terrible, fateful day?’

‘Twas in the 3^rd Afghan War

He took his rifle standing proud

And was hear to shout and roar.

“Who goes there?” his nerves on edge.

But the assailant answered not,

And Grandad had made a pledge.

Raising his rifle battered and wonky,

He shot, the silence riven

Standing over the fallen donkey.

How do we tolerate war without glory?

Stomach killing and pain in war?

If not through a comical story.

Grandad never told of slaughter

In battle weary lands

Across the divided water.

But the story makes us smile

And we mention aloud his name

And he is back with us for a while.


By Linda Prince 



 

Fields

Fields

The wind rustles over the carpet and the soft mist of shade sways

Green.

Curving in concord, each blade the brother of the next.

One veneer, one hue.

Yet every blade is different, every blade contains history,

Evolution wrapped up in a small green shoot.

The breeze glides over the meadow and the soft haze of hues swing

Red.

Bending in unison, each poppy the sister of the next.

One covering, one tone.

Yet every stalk is distinctive, every stalk holds bygones,

Evolution wrapped up in a small red flower.

The chill envelops the fields and the soft fog of colours fall

Red, yellow, black, brown, white.

Collapsing in sympathy, each the sibling of the next.

Blankets of colour, many shades.

Yet every soldier is unique, every comrade preserves a bloodline

Evolution’s highest pinnacle wrapped up in a Flanders shroud.

So many colours side by side, brothers in arms, daughters of time

Sleeping in Flanders Fields

By Linda Prince

We’ll raise a Glass

We’ll raise a Glass

The light is dimming, evening falls

As I am fallen.

My head is swimming, the day is dying

As am I.

And in my ears the jagged explosions of distant grenades.

In the gentlemen’s club they read the news

More casualities of war, the price of metal increases

They pay their subscriptions, I pay their dues.

My lips are cracked and I gasp with thirst.

Their bottle is cracked open and the liquid spills out

As drop by drop, life’s blood ebbs from those here cursed.

In a foreign field I stare up at the stars,

mud caked round my lips and clogging my throat.

In the Foreign Office they are propping up bars.

The lights are dimming, the barman wipes his eyes,

And in ‘Wipers’ many eyes are closing.

And in the Gentleman’s private club they raise one last glass

And gentle men and privates raise one last sigh.

They raise a toast to the fallen ones,

Whiskey chasers and slugs of fine malt slip down gullets before bed.

And somewhere on a bed of debris a slug slips through my head.

Goodnight.
 
Linda Prince