To us he looked like one of the 'Un! To the 'Un he was one of us.
Both sides let him have it.
Him who had come to die for us
and by God He did.
Hung on the barbed wire for days on end
we all thinking will it never end.
Crying for His Father getting on our ****** nerves.
Some say they saw him at the Somme
some say at Crucifix Corner "...forgive them for they know not..."
it went on and on '...what they've done."
But I had by gum! I pitied the poor ******.
Crawled out under ****** fire.
Put my last ciggie between his lips
made of nothing but tea leaves....liquorice...treacle.
"Thanks mate.!" he gasped with his last breath
turning into young Tommy Smith at His Death.
A right good lad I knew from Huddersfield.
Shell shocked they said I was.
I wasn't.
All men are the Son of God as it happens.
Even a dead 'Un is one.
The Son of God is forever getting it wrong.
Christ! Will He ever learn.
Timing His next Coming to land up in WW11.
Other Wars waiting in the wings
for Him to come again.
Wish He would just give up on us.
He's of no ****** use whatsoever.
Death is a better friend.
Survival as I know is Hell.
***
"...FRESHER FIELDS THAN FLANDERS..." is the last line of a Preface that Wilfred Owen intended for his book.
Was first going to write a sci-fi thing with the Saviour coming down at just the wrong time. But as I wrote I remembered an old man I used to look after who would tell me about his WW11 experiences and of his grand dad's tales from WW1 so that it ended up as a mixture of the real and the unreal in the surreal situation of war and all it entails.