ABATTOIR
Shambling, beleaguered soldiers,
Ragged boots – demonic dreams,
Undergo incessant horror;
Dying moans and tortuous screams.
A wretched, weary company
Of dehumanized mankind
With no respite or tranquillity
To restore demented minds.
Praying vainly for oblivion
To erase the horror from their eyes
Of this incessant, moral duty
That will finally brutalize.
The gaunt figure of a trooper
With ravaged, gas-seared lungs
Collapses in the trench, exhausted
– doomed and certainly unsung.
His pain-contorted features bleakly
Focus on a shifting, bloody puddle,
Lying foetal-crouched with comrades
In this sodden, muddy huddle,
The `whomp` of bursting shells
Pounds a perpetual tattoo.
Abject, he watches ripples in the puddle
Ripple, flatten then renew.
Each detonation`s cascading debris
Showers our trench with mud and glar.
Then the soldier`s final whimper
Shudders through this sordid abattoir.