No one said it, everybody knew,
War had changed him.
All pretended it hadn't,
Happy he was home.
Time was not a healer,
Carried on fighting the war.
Anger fuelled by drinking,
Violent outbursts.
Battered, shell-shocked wife and kids,
Soldiers all, in their own way.
'They also serve who stand and wait',
That's what we used to say.
He did what soldiers shouldn't do,
Retreated, cut off, by the foe.
Low on supplies and ammo.
Trapped in no-man's land.
He foraged and found an abandoned cache.
Grabbed hidden liquor and pilfered pills
Trapped by the barbed wire of his mind,
He left the war behind.
Barry Alexander
Doha
December 2014
YOU ARE READING
Danger Close
PoetryA short collection of modern war poetry 1995 - 2014 Highly personal, this short anthology draws on the writer's experiences as a soldier and officer of the British Army in conflict zones in Europe, Africa, Iraq and Afghanistan. Although, the major...
