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Description
Searching, searching
in the enclosing forest and muck.
Searching with bullets flying past:
Next the loud crash—
the scream, the moan, the shout of pain,
the muffled, ‘help,’
no chance for safety.
The stream of blood
warm down my side,
I trudge on,
only to be stopped:
Another cry—
this one mine.

Body numbed with pain,
no more can I feel.
I fall and I’m left to crawl.
Fever from a rash
heats through my blood,
my vision falls out of control.
Wound so small,
yet so demanding;
I can feel my system crashing.
Can see the letter sent home,
“Died in Action”
it will say.
My parents will cry and live life;
I will die with no hope of life.

I pull myself along,
and remember my girl.
A smile reaches my lips
through this fog.
My head keeps spinning,
yet I raise my rifle.
I pull myself to my knees,
only to fall once more.
No chance for survival
in this foreign jungle
this maze of innocence
found in leaves, flowers and trees.

Such irony this war,
this battle for life and death.
Pawns are we all,
as I crumble—fall,
unable to remember my
last steps of life;
I can only see the light.

Description
Searching, searching
in the enclosing forest and muck.
Searching with bullets flying past:
Next the loud crash—
the scream, the moan, the shout of pain,
the muffled, ‘help,’
no chance for safety.
The stream of blood
warm down my side,
I trudge on,
only to be stopped:
Another cry—
this one mine.

Body numbed with pain,
no more can I feel.
I fall and I’m left to crawl.
Fever from a rash
heats through my blood,
my vision falls out of control.
Wound so small,
yet so demanding;
I can feel my system crashing.
Can see the letter sent home,
“Died in Action”
it will say.
My parents will cry and live life;
I will die with no hope of life.

I pull myself along,
and remember my girl.
A smile reaches my lips
through this fog.
My head keeps spinning,
yet I raise my rifle.
I pull myself to my knees,
only to fall once more.
No chance for survival
in this foreign jungle
this maze of innocence
found in leaves, flowers and trees.

Such irony this war,
this battle for life and death.
Pawns are we all,
as I crumble—fall,
unable to remember my
last steps of life;
I can only see the light.