What It Was Like
( In The Trenches )

Sandbags riddled with bullet holes made up
the parapet, and barbed wire protected the
trenches which were waterlogged knee deep in
mud and stinking from overflowing cesspits.

Every soldier was infested with lice and from
this, many were suffering the severe pains of
trench fever. The cold wet and unsanitary
conditions were causing trench foot, this in
a lot of cases led to amputations.

Over the top "No Mansland" an inhospitable
wasteland of craters and blackened tree stumps.
The burnt out remains of buildings added to the
eeriness of this desolate hell on earth.

Brown and black rats in their thousands
were feeding on the bodies of the dead,
which were then exposed from their shallow graves.
The air was filled with the smell of cordite
and the sickening odour of poisonous gas.

Death was the trenches companion day and night
from the snipers bullet, artillery bombardment,
gas and disease. That’s what it was like.

So was it any wonder that on that Christmas morning
the troops from both sides laid down their arms
and walked out into no mansland, shaking hands,
exchanging cigarettes and chocolate, showing
photographs of their families, and wishing each
other a “ Merry Christmas ”
and guess what, they even played football.

The early morning mist drifts silently across 
the freshly ploughed and seeded fields, 
from one ridge to the next hopping birds
are seeking their routine day-break feast.

Along the lane pressed in tarmac the carrion
is being picked apart by hungry crows 
who also keep a watchful eye 
for speeding traffic and hunting foxes.

The dawns early sunshine starts slowly 
burning away the mist and in nearby fields 
the blood red poppies awake and stand tall
on their green and strong supporting stems...

but in these green fields of times long past
the mist was smoke and gas, the furrows
craters, the seeds were shells and the crows
were rats as big as cats and the carrion was 
the Johns, the Daves, the Jims and Jacks...

Fly so fast the years they do
and my mind is not as once it was,
forgetting things such as dates and names
and going round as though I´m lost,
in every room I stop and wonder
why did I come in here,
what is it, that I´m looking for,
not a clue I fear.

Have you seen my reading glasses
Yes! she says, you´ve got them on your head,
and what about my car keys
I´ve looked everywhere, including in the shed,
and when I bend, why is it
that I always grunt and groan,
and my back today, is not the best of backs
I am so racked with aches and pains.

My eyesight´s not as sharp these days
and my hearing, Sorry, what d´you say,
no longer do I walk upright
and my thinning hair is turning grey,
but although the body´s ageing
and the memory´s fading fast,
my brain still thinks I´m eighteen
and I can do things, as I did in the past.

So I´m off to run a marathon
and the channel I shall swim
and when I get home from clubbing
I´ll be heading for the gym,
I´ve parked my zimmer in the corner
and my pillows I have plumped,
the douvet I have pulled up tight
as I start to snore and dream, and trump.