The ignorant called him ‘the mullah’,
And laughed out loud at his pain.
He knew Greek and could talk about Sulla,
As he walked his yellow Great Dane.
In Loos he had been a daredevil
Who wanted his men to beat fear.
Battalion called him ‘Wild Neville’,
Not caring the wear and the tear.
He sat on the fire step and smoked,
As the shells tore the trenches apart.
He was jaunty in step and he joked
Though terror was bursting his heart.
He found young Orr in pieces,
Head, limbs and a flayed trunk.
He crawled though the brains, blood and
faeces
And shrank small in the mud in a funk.
At night he sweated and screamed;
He had to sleep with the light;
Young Orr would approach when he dreamed;
And call to him all through the night.
Talking ‘shell-shock’ is trite and banal.
This soldier had never been free.
He folded his clothes by the elder tree
And found peace in the long still canal.
No comments:
Post a Comment