Amnesty.  the 11th hour, the 11th day, the 11th month, the year 1918
A knock upon a large closed door.
A lady awaiting news on her son.

Seven days pre before was the time he was no more.

Flags and banners waving fiercely,
Horns and whistles, shouts and cheers.
A welcome end to the bloodiest war,
Celebrations for peace, we’d won.

But for this fine lady, of a fine young son,
On this fine day for some.
She had waited, then through post discovered,
her son was lost to war,
Just seven days pre end before.

A man of the field he had been,
Reporting in words all he’d seen,
Gruesome accounts of the highest scale,
Not no tale,
But truth and sincere his word his actions, his doing.
All in order to settle a score and record what happened through four long years in war before.

My pen my gun, my ink my bullets,
I fire onto canvass to create an image,
Of four long years of the gruesome war
and all the gruesome scenes within it.

And upon reflection on your completion,
Please remember our finest sons.
Of which Wilfred Owen was one
and as a wartime poet was penning,
as he was fighting in it.



Robert Kingston 17.10.14