Star of Mons

Nineteen-fourteen, the battle for Mons 

First mass offensive on a foreign shore 

Two tribal gatherings, juxtaposed 

Intent upon the brutal art of war

My grandfather, still a young man 

I see him now, astride that gelding horse 

Above the thundering hooves that lifted soil 

He galloped hard across the burning gorse

I see him now, upon that desperate ride 

Important message clutched within his hand, 

Racing down the lethal lines of fire, 

A signal delivered to the high command

Then back, returning down that torrid line 

With guns and rifles blazing all around 

Dodging the shrapnel and the mortal fire 

Deafened by the conflagration sound

Mentioned in dispatches for his deeds 

His courageous act above the call, beyond 

Although grandfather bravely soldiered on 

He never made it to the river Somme

Steve Wheeler © 11 November, 2021

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I am thinking of our glorious past

I am thinking of our glorious past 

with heart ablaze and tears that last. 

My mind dwells on the fields of gold and green, 

still virgin in the budding, nascent spring. 

I contemplate the memories of the glories past; 

now faint and faded, almost gone. 

Sienna photos, framed in sepia tones 

a century of dust has landed on.

I am thinking of my grandfather, 

who marched with others clothed in green, 

to Passchendaele, the Somme, Verdun, 

their buttons glinting brassy, in the morning sun.

I hear the clatter of the horses bridles, 

and the boys together, marching from the fields and colliery; 

The jokes and coarse humour, the nervous laughter; 

Young men forged together in their camaraderie.

I am thinking of our glorious past, 

the Empire in its great majestic might, 

feeding young lives, systematically and sure 

as raw meat and sinew, bone and blood 

into the ravenous jaws of the machine of war.

Steve Wheeler © 9 November, 2021

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Over the top

Midnight,

yet the sky is white

hot with tracers and

shell bursts through the night.

We shiver, we cower

in a long dirt bower

as the after burn sears

our brains and the noise

rattles our bones

to stokes our fears.

We are cold.

We are hungry.

The King’s shilling

has no value here.

We crouch on duckboards,

knee deep in the slurry

and the mire,

that sucks constantly

at our sodden boots.

Below us, a poisoned

quagmire, stinking

with effluent; and above,

a more lethal concoction,

A world of screaming metal

and molten lead.

A scream.

A curse.

Sudden, the mud and earth

rise beneath our feet

as the wooden rampart

shatter and falls,

we find our feet again and

listen to the wounded calls

for help, for mother, for God.

Just as suddenly, the noise abates,

into a cold black silence....

....and then the whistle.

that dreaded whistle blows, repeated and repeated

along the dark lines

relayed into the blackness.

The signal of what is soon to come.

The metallic clink as

the bayonets are turned

onto cold iron, and our

hearts are turned to ice.

And then we are up

and over the top.....

We are over.

Steve Wheeler © 8 November, 2021

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Requiem

The madness of battle,

rapacious roar of conflict,

terrible in its bitterness and bite,

a feral snarl of discord.

Oh, the voracious appetite

of war; its implacable

ability to destroy, to utterly

obliterate each new generation!

A manmade hell; the falling shell.

Young hearts pound in fear;

young blood courses down into

red raw soil of the field,

drenching the world with

anguish and blind torment.

And still, into the fight

the soldiers march, encumbered by

authority, led by their own

valour, weighted down by

history, bedecked with the

future glories of gross futility. 

We shall remember them, we

shall weep for them and we

shall celebrate their sacrifice,

when each last post is called and

each last flag is lowered. 

But, as our memories fade

who shall, in their turn 

our own memories preserve?

Steve Wheeler © 3 November, 2021

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